


In the Trenches

by Neena



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-28
Updated: 2011-02-28
Packaged: 2017-10-16 00:10:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/166332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neena/pseuds/Neena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Defenceless and facing a relentless demon-raised army, the only hope for the Winchester brothers is that Castiel can get his mojo back in time to prevent an all-out war.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Trenches

**Author's Note:**

> Set around mid-season five.

Chapter One

Through the windshield of the idling Impala, Dean watched as the wide, prairie sky turned an inky black in the east, with only a smudge of blood-red crusting the edge of the western horizon. He checked his watch. Again. It wasn’t telling him anything he didn’t already know: they were running out of time, and Castiel was nowhere to be found.  
A tiny, frustrated sigh emanated from the passenger seat, where Sam sat, his long legs bouncing slightly with impatience. Dean eyed his brother, wondering if and when Sammy was going to get around to voicing his opinion on whether or not to pull the plug on this mission. This ‘equal footing’ deal was great in theory, but at times like these, Dean longed for the days when there was a nice, clean chain of command, and every decision didn’t have to be ratified by a committee before action was taken.

“He’s not coming,” Sam said at last, his brow set into its usual deep frown. Dean was starting to forget what his brother looked like without it.

“He’ll show,” Dean replied with conviction. “He’s never let us down before.”

They sat a while longer in silence, as the cobalt blue in the west was hammered into submission by nightfall. Any minute now, the fields surrounding them were going to churn and crack and disgorge an army of soldiers moulded from the earth itself – clay monsters raised by demon sorcery and all but unstoppable. The only weapon they had against these bastards was Castiel, whose angelic presence was capable of subduing them, rendering the soldiers inert...that is, if he got to them before they became fully animated.

As the last vestiges of daylight died in the sky, the ground started to rumble, right on cue. All around them the fallow fields began to percolate, mounds of dirt and grass reforming and taking on a familiarly human shape. In the ditch next to Sam’s window, the bowed earth burst suddenly upwards, the mud and weeds twining together in a sick mockery of sinew and muscle until a fully formed clay man lifted its feet from the ground and lurched shakily forward. It was so close to the car that Dean could clearly see the beetles and worms writhing in the soldier’s muddy skin and how, as the eyeless dirt face turned up towards the dim moonlight, a sinkhole appeared in place of a mouth. A god-awful howling arose from the creature, and it was echoed back by others – countless others, throughout the surrounding farmland.

Sam turned to him with an expression that reeked of I-told-ya-sos, just as a muddy hand slapped up against the passenger-side window. “Dean...”

“Fine,” Dean gave in. What choice did he have? Castiel had missed his window of opportunity, and now the neighbouring town of Red River was going to suffer for it. They could only pray that there would be a town left, come sunrise, and that they’d have a second chance to lay the army to rest before night fell again over these fields.  
Dean put the car into gear and pealed out onto the deserted highway. Their headlights sliced through the country darkness, boring holes into the distance without illuminating the scenery around them. It was an oppressive landscape – so open and vast, and yet encased in a blackness so absolute they might as well have been driving through a cave. Ignoring his instinct to slow down to a safe speed, Dean put his foot down and felt the Impala’s motor respond with a grumble. If they could make it into Red River in time to warn people, they might be able to save some of them.

He was so focused on his goal that Dean jumped when his cell phone rang in his jacket pocket. It took a few fumbling tries before he managed to dislodge it, and he flipped it open quickly to put an end to the insistent ringing.

“You better have a damned good excuse, Cas,” he growled into the phone.

There was a slight pause on the other end, and then an unfamiliar, female voice answered him. “Is this Dean?” she asked.

Dean frowned. “Who is this? How’d you get this number?” he shot back, ignoring his brother’s curious glances.

“My name is Michelle Matthews. I’m a nurse at Holy Cross Hospital,” said the woman, more politely than most people would have in response to Dean’s gruffness. “A man was brought into Emergency a few minutes ago, with no ID. Just a cell phone. And your number was the only one on his speed dial.”

A heavy feeling of dread settled on his chest, slowly squeezing at Dean’s heart. “Was this guy wearing a beige trench coat, by any chance?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

There was another pause in which he could hear her conferring with someone in the background. “No coat, but he may have been wearing one before the paramedics began working on him. They had to cut away some of his clothing,” she explained.

“Are you in Red River?” Dean asked, doing his best to sound calm when he was anything but.

“Cold Creek,” she answered. “But he was brought here from Red River. We’re the closest hospital, I’m afraid. There’s nothing much around here but cows.”

“I’m on my way,” said Dean, snapping his phone shut. He cast a quick glance at Sam, who was watching him with wide eyes, waiting to be filled in. “That was the hospital in Cold Creek,” he supplied.

“Castiel?” Sam asked, sounding more surprised than concerned. Dean couldn’t really blame him – this was unprecedented. Cas had battled angels and demons alike and had bounced back without needing so much as a Band-Aid. Still, it irked Dean that his brother didn’t seem even remotely worried.

Dean pursed his lips and nodded. He knew what Sam was going to say next, and he didn’t want to hear it.

“Dean, we have to go to Red River. We have to get those people outta there.”

A flash of anger sparked in Dean’s eyes as he slid his gaze sideways to look at his brother. “This is Cas, Sam,” he ground out between clenched teeth. “We’re going to Cold Creek; end of discussion.”

Sam looked back at him in disbelief. “Right,” he drawled back at him. “This is Cas, Dean. Cas. He’ll be fine, like always. But there’s a town full of people who are going to be sod-fodder if we don’t get them out of Dodge, right now.”

Dean’s nostrils flared and he gripped the steering wheel tight. He knew Sammy was right; that was the kicker. Logic and reason were pointing towards Red River with brightly flashing neon signs, but he couldn’t shake the chest-gripping fear that Castiel needed him. Sure, he’d always healed quickly before, but what if this time was different? The only other time he’d been rendered unconscious, he’d come to as Jimmy Novak. But Jimmy was gone now – whisked off to his eternal reward after Raphael blew him to pieces along with the angel that was borrowing his body. If Cas had been snatched away by the angels again, what would happen to his empty vessel? Would it die? Would Cas have to find a new vessel? For some reason, that thought upset Dean a lot. He didn’t know why; he’d seen demons and angels shucking off bodies in favour of new ones like they were all taking part in some kind of celestial fashion show. But the thought of Cas without those pensive blue eyes just seemed wrong somehow.

“Well?” Sam prodded when Dean didn’t reply.

“If it was Bobby, we wouldn’t be having this discussion,” Dean grumbled.

“Bobby’s family,” Sam stated matter-of-factly.

Dean was about to argue that Castiel was family, too, but that didn’t feel right. Cas wasn’t family; he didn’t fit in with them the way Bobby, Ellen and Jo had. But he fit in with Dean just fine. Cas was something different. Special. At least to Dean he was; and if Sam couldn’t see that, then he obviously didn’t understand how important the angel had become to him. Hell, he didn’t really understand it himself.

The headlights snagged on a road sign welcoming them to the township of Red River. The carved wooden sign had once been brightly painted in greens, yellows and blues, but the paint had long since faded, chipping and cracking in places to reveal the reddish-coloured wood beneath. In the brief moment it was illuminated, the cracks in the painted river on the sign appeared to be bleeding. It sent a shiver down Dean’s spine.

Despite the twitchy, anxious feeling at the base of his skull, Dean took the turnoff into town instead of pushing on towards Cold Creek, which was another fifteen minutes down the highway. “Happy?” he snipped, his shoulders hunching against the chilly wrongness of going against his gut instincts.

“What’s wrong with you?” Sam goaded, looking at him suspiciously.

“Nothing.” The curtness in his voice put a swift end to the conversation. Sam shook his head and sighed before returning his attention to the road, leaving Dean to stew in silence.

A couple of minutes down the road they came across a western-style bar called the Red Barn Tavern on the outskirts of town. The parking lot was jam-packed with trucks and SUVs, with the odd import squeezed in for good measure. The sound of twangy guitar music seeped through the door, which was propped open with a brick. A clutch of smokers huddled near the entrance, closing ranks against the sharp evening breeze.

Dean’s eyebrows rose as he met his brother’s eyes. Sam, too, looked baffled. From the looks of it, the entire town was crammed into the bar, filling it to bursting point. A wild cheer broke out, temporarily drowning out the sound of country music. It was followed by a rhythmic chanting and finally another hooting cheer from the crowd.

“Sounds like my kind of town,” Dean admitted with some reluctance. He slowed the Impala to a crawl, scanning for a place to park. The lot was full, but there were cars perched on the shoulders of the road as far as the eye could see, and about a block away Dean spied a gap that might just fit his baby.

Walking from the car towards the saloon-style bar, Dean couldn’t help noticing the vast number of rifle racks affixed to the trucks and SUVs they passed. With an arsenal like this at their disposal, the people of Red River just might stand a chance, he thought.

They nodded at the squinty-eyed smokers at the door, pushing their way past a clot of half-plastered patrons until they were expelled into the muggy heat of the bar. Warm bodies pressed in on them from every direction, the air heavy with the fug of stale beer and perspiration. Much to Dean’s chagrin, it looked a lot like the synchronous gyrating taking place at the centre of the floor was line dancing. He moaned in spiritual pain over the injustice of it all. Why’d it have to be line dancing?

“What d’you think?” Sam shouted at him, his voice barely penetrating through the clamorous din of the bar, despite being only a foot away.

“I think we got ourselves a posse,” Dean shouted back and was met with an expression of distaste from his brother.

“Now is NOT the time, Dean,” Sam barked at him, confusing him until he figured out the misunderstanding.

“I said ‘POSSE’, you pig!”

Sam’s mouth formed an O of understanding before cracking into a goofy smile. And he always called Dean immature. Go figure!

The current song ended with a few catcalls and hoots from the revellers, and a withered, leathery-faced old man with a busty, pony-tailed barmaid supporting him, took to the podium. A ridiculously large white cowboy hat pushed down past the old man’s ears, obscuring his eyes. He was so tottery that he looked like he might keel over before making it to the microphone.

The crowd quieted instantly when the old geezer blew into the mic, causing it give an ear-splitting, electronic squeal. The man’s reedy voice puffed against the sensitive equipment and his audience winced as the speakers squealed again.

“Good evening, Red River,” he wheezed and grinned a crinkly, false-toothed smile at the crowd. “Welcome to Buck Night. As you know, hunting season starts at precisely 12:01 AM, and at 12:02 I will be announcing the winner of the Hummer you all’ve been drooling over for the last four weeks.” There was a smattering of laughter and applause at this announcement, followed by a low-level murmuring which ended only when the mic crackled to life again beneath the old man’s breath. “So until then, eat, drink, and don’t forget to bribe the raffle officials.” His departing wave nearly threw him off balance, but the pretty, young barmaid quickly stepped forward to catch him. The music was blaring again before the old dude had even made it off the stage.

Dean nudged Sam in the ribs and leaned in to speak into his ear. “Let’s get some air.”  
Sam nodded in reply, not bothering to attempt a verbal response now that the floor-stomping tunes had kicked into high gear again.

A new batch of smokers eyed them as they exited the building, quickly dismissing them as a non-threat before resuming their carcinogenic pastime. Dean yanked on his brother’s sleeve, guiding him further away from the door so they could talk without being overheard.

“This looks like a good place to make a stand,” Sam said when they were alone.

Dean dipped his head in agreement. “The children of the cornfield won’t get here for a while. They may be deadly as hell, but they’re slow. Plenty of time to get these people armed and secured. You can handle that, can’t you Sammy?” Dean clapped his kid brother on the arm and started walking back to the Impala. Of course he knew he wouldn’t get far without Sam protesting, but it was worth a shot.

“Where’re you going? There’s an army of mud men heading this way, and you’re leaving me?” Sam asked incredulously.

“I’ll be back before the fun starts, Sammy, but I gotta go. I’ve got a bad feeling. I think he needs me.” There was no need to clarify who ‘he’ was, and Dean didn’t stick around to get pulled into another argument on the subject. He had an angel to attend to.

 

 

Chapter Two

 

The road hummed beneath the Impala – a steady, reassuring song that nevertheless jarred Dean’s nerves. He was wound so tight that his fingernails were posing a serious threat to the integrity of the steering wheel. This wasn’t normal. Leaving his brother in the middle of a fight – that was something he just didn’t do. Not ever. But right now he felt an overpowering need to find Castiel. He had to. That realisation alone was enough to scare Dean. He needed to see Cas like an addict in serious need of his next fix - his skin crawled with it.

“Dean,” he heard a faint voice say.

Dean nearly swerved off the road at the unexpected sound. He didn’t bother looking around, because he knew the voice had been in his head. Normally, Dean would have chewed Cas out for scaring the living bejeezus out of him while he was driving, but the angel’s voice sounded so... desperate. The last time Cas had popped into his head for a visit, the angels had ripped him out of his meat-suit to prevent him from talking.

“I’m coming, Cas. Hang in there, pal,” he said out loud. Without thinking, he took the next turnoff; he knew instinctively that it was a faster route. This road was narrower and in bad need of repair, but within minutes it brought him to the eastern outskirts of Cold Creek. As he merged onto the main road, he was greeted by a blue and white hospital sign with an arrow helpfully pointing the way.

He parked in the staff parking lot and half-ran to the emergency entrance. A tough-looking teenager clutching his bleeding arm was hogging the admitting nurse, and Dean practically ploughed into the guy in his haste to be seen.

“Hey! Not cool!” the bleach-blond kid yelped. He puffed his chest out, trying to look imposing and utterly failing. Dean took a quick glance at the gash in the boy’s arm and figured he’d survive waiting a few more minutes.

The nurse on duty blinked up at him in surprise. Pulling out a random piece of ID and flashing it in her face, Dean got right down to business.

“I got a call that a friend of mine was brought in not long ago,” he stated, hoping he didn’t sound as anxious as he felt.

The nurse, whose name tag confirmed was the same Michelle he’d talked to on the phone, blinked at him a moment longer and then a light went off behind her wide doe-brown eyes. “You must be Dean,” she said, proud of herself for making the connection.

“I must be,” he answered with a forced smile. He was not in the mood to make small talk, no matter how perky the little brunette nurse was.

“Curtain 5, down the hall,” she informed him with a sweet smile, and then turned her attention back to the ticked-off teen in front of her with an equally sweet smile.

“Thanks,” Dean tossed back over his shoulder as he put the desk behind him in search of Curtain 5. The ER was crazy busy, with nurses and orderlies buzzing around and patients that were spilling out of the woodworks. It was a full moon…and, oh yeah, the Apocalypse, so really, that shouldn’t have come as much of a surprise.

All of the little cubicles were curtained off, and Dean inadvertently witnessed more than one naked backside trying to find Castiel. Apparently curtain numbers were assigned randomly, because none of them were actually marked, and Cas  
turned out to be behind the seventh one, not the fifth, as one would assume.

Dean didn’t know what he’d expected to see, but it wasn’t this. Lying as limp as a ragdoll, his face ashy grey, Castiel looked tiny, insignificant and helpless. He’d been hooked up to monitors and attached to IVs, and even though  
they’d cleaned him up, there was still the odd speck or streak of blood marring his pale skin. His left leg was splinted and his head was wrapped in a stark, white bandage above a swollen-shut eye, but what scared Dean the most was the bared chest and the two square, red burn marks that indicated they’d had to jumpstart his heart. Dean felt the blood drain from his face and he sat down heavily at the foot of Cas’ bed.

“Are you Dean?” someone asked from behind him. That someone turned out to be a hefty young Asian doctor in green scrubs clutching a bag of saline and looking supremely compassionate. Nurse Michelle must have put the word out that Dean had arrived and sent the doc to talk to him.

“Yeah, I’m Dean,” he replied. “What happened? Is he gonna be okay?”

The man looked apologetically at him, which made Dean’s blood freeze, fearing the worst. “My name is Doctor Clark, but before I can tell you anything, I need to ask: are you his family? I’m so sorry to have to ask, but it’s hospital regulations.”

Dean sighed in relief. “Cas doesn’t have any family. I’m the closest thing he’s got – we’re…friends.” And geez, when he put it that way, it sounded more than a little hinky. It seemed to do the trick, though, because the doc gave him an understanding smile and a friendly pat on the arm.

“Your ‘friend’ Cas was unconscious when he arrived, but the man who called the ambulance said he was attacked by a gang just outside a bar in Red River. By the time the police arrived the perps got away.”

‘Perps’, Dean thought wryly. Did people actually talk like that? He nodded at the guy, encouraging him to continue, even though he had a pretty good idea of what really happened. Angels and demons were skirmishing, as Castiel had once put it.

“Anyway, Cas?” the doctor asked, testing the name Dean had provided; and when Dean nodded again, he continued on his trip down exposition road. “Cas lost a great deal of blood before help arrived, and his heart went into v-tach. Luckily the paramedics reached him in time. He’s stable for now, but he’s in need of a transfusion, and his head trauma is worrisome.”

“And by worrisome you mean…”

“I mean that he needs careful observation. With head injuries as severe as this, we have to watch for signs of internal bleeding or swelling that could cause brain damage. He just returned from having a CAT scan, and I should have the results soon. Our main concern for the moment is dealing with the blood loss. All we can do right now push fluids and monitor Cas while we wait for the blood bank to scrounge up some B negative. It’s been a crazy weekend, and the local bank is depleted. They’re working on bringing some in from neighbouring towns.”

Dean was aware that his mouth was gaping open in a very unattractive way, but he couldn’t help it. This was why he’d needed to be here – he had the same blood type as Castiel’s vessel. Cas must have been calling to him on some subconscious level or something so he could give him his blood.

“Sir?” the doc asked, his head tilted in concern. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Fine. Whatever,” Dean replied automatically. “You said he needed B negative, right?”

Doctor Clark frowned, clearly not having anticipated Dean’s question. “That’s right.”

“Then you can use my blood,” Dean said, yanking up the sleeve of his jacket as though the doc had a needle ready for just such an occasion. “I’m B negative.”

Doctor Clark’s face broke out in a relieved smile. “That’s the first piece of good news we’ve had here all day, Mr…?”

“Winchester. Dean Winchester,” he answered with a smug smile; as if he was personally responsible for the coincidental blood match.

“Stay right here,” Dr. Clark ordered politely and hurried off to make arrangements.

In less than ten minutes Dean had filled out the necessary paperwork and was given a cot next to Castiel’s bed. He’d never given blood before – needles had never really been high up on his list of favourite things – but the nurses were making him feel like a celebrity, plying him with juice and cookies and generally treating him like a hero. He was starting to consider making this a regular thing.

After assuring yet another nurse that he was fine, Dean was left alone in the curtained off cubicle with Castiel. He turned his head to get a better view of his injured friend. He watched as his blood made the short journey through a tube to the other man’s arm and imagined that he could already see some colour returning to Castiel’s skin.

“Come on, you lazy-ass angel. Wake up. We’ve got mud monsters out there, and they’re not gonna smite themselves,” Dean whispered. When his jibe failed to do the trick, he added the extra threat, “don’t make me come in there after you.”

The next thing he knew, Dean was standing outside the Red Barn Tavern in Red River. Only it wasn’t really the Red Barn, because it was daylight and there were only a handful of cars in the parking lot. A small crowd was gathered around the side of the building and as Dean approached, he saw that it wasn’t so much a crowd as an angry mob of demons, and Castiel was at the centre of it. He was putting up one helluva fight, from the looks of it, but he was outnumbered and for some unknown reason, these demons were totally kicking the snot out of him. Either they were some new kind of super demon with powers that could take down one of the Heavenly Host, or Cas had lost his mojo.

Dean’s memory flashed on the conversation he’d had with a resigned, pill-popping Cas from 2014. He’d said that when the other angels abandoned Earth, he slowly became mortal. Human. But that was five years from now in a future that Dean was not willing to accept as destiny, and this was no slow drain of power. This was more like the plug had been yanked out of the socket leaving the poor guy utterly defenceless.

“Dean!” Castiel shouted before going down under a maelstrom of fists.

Dean was running flat out now, swatting aside demons like they were piñatas. That was the first clue that this wasn’t real. If it had been real, the demons would have torn him to shreds before he’d made a dent in their ranks. Instead, he was able to shove his way through effortlessly until he was crouching over Castiel, who was curled up in a ball on the tarmac. The demons backed off, keeping their distance from Dean as if he was toxic. It left them in a demon-free zone about fifteen feet in diameter. When it was clear that the demons no longer posed a threat, Dean focused his attention on Castiel, gently laying his hand on the angel’s shoulder. He jumped at Dean’s touch, curling away from what he perceived was another threat.

“Whoa, there, Cas. It’s just me,” said Dean.

A terrified blue eye peeked through the protective shield of trench coat-clad arms. Castiel let out a shuddering breath and some of the tension went out of his coiled frame. With a little more coaxing, Dean was able to sneak past Castiel’s defences enough to see the extent of his injuries. Just as he’d noted in the emergency room, Cas’ left eye was swollen shut and he was also bleeding heavily from a gash in his forehead. The one blue eye that was still functioning didn’t seem to be focusing properly, and the pupil looked blown. His left leg below the knee was bent at an impossible angle, and Dean could clearly see a bright white shard of bone jutting from the bloody wreckage of Castiel’s pants. And to top it all off, a thick, sticky pool of blood was slowly forming beneath him. Dean couldn’t see where it was coming from, but it was bad.

“You came,” Castiel stated with some amazement. A flicker of a smile briefly lit his battered face.

“Of course I came,” Dean admonished. “What kind of talk is that? Now you’re gonna work some of that angel-healing mojo, and we’re gonna get out of here. Right?”

In answer, Cas’ eye rolled up in his head and he went completely limp.

“Oh no, you don’t!” Dean shouted, shaking the angel as roughly as he dared. “You are NOT leaving me stranded inside your head. You hear me? Cas? Cas!” His shouts fell on deaf ears, and as Dean looked up, he realised that they were alone. The demons were gone. The Red Barn Tavern was gone. Everything for miles around was gone except for him and the unconscious angel.

 

 

Chapter Three

 

His first thought upon waking was that his skull was coming apart. Cracking his eye open seemed to confirm it – there was an ice-pick-wielding madman laying siege to Castiel’s head. Confronting the pain head on, he bravely kept his eye open to take in his surroundings. Hemmed in by thin green curtains on a metal track, with soft ambient light coming from an embedded wall fixture; cool air on his bare chest…he was in a hospital. He’d been in one before, but he was fairly certain he hadn’t been a patient at the time. Castiel raised his arm to feel whatever it was that was preventing his other eye from opening, but found that his arm was attached to a needle and some tubing. He followed the tubing back to a young man asleep on a bed next to his. They were tethered together, and yet he had no idea why, or who the other man was.

The pounding in his head was gradually lessening, and he was now becoming aware of other pains. His leg was in agony, and there was a searing pain in his back, just below his ribcage. Using his free hand, Castiel’s fingers explored his face, prodding the tight, swollen skin around his left eye and then upwards where a cottony-soft bandage was wrapped around his forehead.

He was confused. Disoriented. Vital memories kept skating just out of reach, taunting him. There was a reason he was here, and it was extremely important. He was needed somewhere…a battlefield. Had he been wounded in battle? It seemed unlikely that anything on Earth possessed the power to cripple him so devastatingly. In his experience, only an archangel wielded that kind of power, and yet, if that were the case, he would not have been left in his vessel to suffer. No; there would have been far worse suffering in store for him in Heaven if the angels had decided to take him out.

Then there was the nagging issue of why he wasn’t healing the way he should be. Normally, his vessel mended itself almost instantly. Now, however, he had to focus his entire will on mending his injuries, and it seemed like his efforts were scarcely making a dent.

The only viable explanation was unthinkable. He’d lost his Grace.

Castiel had the overwhelming urge to rip the needle out of his arm and go off in search of answers, but something stayed him. A tiny, almost inaudible voice inside his head was begging him not to leave; calling him a son of a bitch? The voice was familiar and struck a chord deep inside him. A name slowly began to surface through the fog in his mind: Dean.

His gaze slid sideways towards the unconscious man next to him. He still couldn’t say definitively that he recognised the man, but there was a strong emotional tug when he looked at his face. Emotions like the kind he was now feeling were dangerous and may well have been the cause of his current state, especially if he’d been foolish enough to act on them. Had his brothers decided to punish him? Had they shunned him to teach him a lesson?

It was frustrating not being able to remember. The harder he concentrated, the faster the memories fled from his reach. He was left with nothing more than fleeting images and the general impression that he was being hunted. One thing he now knew for certain was that he was not safe where he was. Ignoring the pleading voice in his head, Castiel eased himself into a sitting position, slowed by the sudden onset of dizziness and nausea. He had to leave; get as far away from this place as possible, and never look back. And maybe, if he could prove he was worthy, he could convince the angels to take him back.

 

***

 

Dr. Clark composed himself, taking a deep breath for courage. Of all the duties he was required to perform as a doctor, this was the worst; having to tell someone their loved one was likely beyond help. He held in his hands the results of his patient’s CT scan, and it was a worst-case scenario. The images showed a massive intracranial hemorrhage, which, when combined with the patient’s current comatose state, was tantamount to a death sentence. They would attempt to alleviate the pressure, of course, but the damage was already done. Cas was undoubtedly brain dead.

As Dr. Clark slid the curtain back on its track, prepared to confer with the young Mr. Winchester, he was stunned speechless by what he saw. Sitting up in bed, his patient was carefully unwinding the bloodied bandage from his head. It wasn’t possible, he knew, and yet his eyes were telling him a different story. The man whose brains had been all but liquefied was staring unblinkingly up at him.

“You must unleash me from these contraptions,” said the man in a deep, gravelly voice. “I have to leave this place at once.”

Dr. Clark literally shook his head, as if by doing so he might wake up from the dream he was having, because there was no way what he was seeing could be real. There had to have been a mix up – clearly the results he held in his hands did not belong to this patient, even though he knew for a fact that the CT scan couldn’t have come from anyone else. The machine must have malfunctioned. It didn’t really matter, though, because right now he had more important things to worry about; like keeping the man from leaving that bed until he had a clear understanding of what was going on with him.

“You can’t leave,” Dr. Clark said, his voice squeaking slightly in disbelief. “By all accounts, you shouldn’t even be alive! We need to run more tests. We need to…”

“I need to leave. Now,” the man demanded sternly.

Dr. Clark swallowed, feeling the weight of his patient’s glare on him. “Sir, you need to understand that you have suffered a severe head injury. I honestly don’t know how you’re even awake, to be frank, and I cannot possibly allow you to leave in your condition. Do you even know where you are?”

The man cocked his head at him, considering the question seriously before answering. “My memories will return with time,” he answered. “But I am not safe here. I have to go.”

Dr. Clark saw Cas going for the IV needle and dropped his clipboard in his rush to stop him from pulling it out. “You’re in no shape to go anywhere,” he insisted, prying the man’s fingers off the IV just in time. “You were stabbed, and you lost a lot of blood. Luckily your boyfriend happens to have the same blood type as you.”

The man’s eye widened and darted away to look at his friend, who must have passed out while he was giving blood. When Cas looked back again, it was with confusion and a touch of fear.

“You don’t recognise him?” Dr. Clark guessed.

“He is Dean,” the man answered with a slight frown.

“That’s right. His name is Dean Winchester.”

A spark of recognition flared in his patient’s eye, followed by an even brighter spark of fear. “I was sent here to protect him. What have I done?”

Clark’s eyes tracked back to the unconscious Dean Winchester. “I wouldn’t worry. It’s not uncommon for someone to pass out the first time they give blood. A little sugar and he’ll be right as rain.”

 

***

 

Castiel felt like he was freefalling. More of the puzzle pieces were falling into place, but nothing made sense. He had been charged with protecting Michael’s vessel in preparation for the final battle, yet somehow he knew it wasn’t just demons that were after the man. The angels were also hunting him. But why would they be hunting down the vessel of Heaven’s greatest weapon in the war against Lucifer? His head throbbed as he concentrated on clearing away the cobwebs that obscured the answers he sought.

The man in the green pyjamas was telling him they were not allowed to leave this place, but Castiel sensed that the longer they remained, the greater the danger that they’d be caught by one side or the other. In such a public place, and in such a weakened state, he was in no position to protect Dean. And he knew deep in his soul that his choice was righteous – even if it had resulted in his fall from Heaven.

Castiel tuned out the noise around him, closing his eyes and allowing his energy to focus on healing. His leg was his first priority. He needed the mobility in order to escape. The rest could wait until he and Dean had found more secure shelter. The itching pain was good; it meant his efforts were paying off, albeit slowly. He could visualise the bones in his leg knitting together, and the muscle and tendons following suit. The long, jagged gash along the outside of his leg had been stitched closed, so there was no immediate threat of infection or blood loss. The superficial mending of his flesh could wait until later.

With his leg now capable of supporting his weight, Castiel re-opened his eyes; or at least the one that actually would open. The pyjama-clad man was attending to Dean at the moment, which left Castiel free to remove the needle from his arm. A little pressure and the tiny puncture was gone. However, blood was still coursing through the rubber tube and out the needle, and it only now dawned on him that he had Dean’s blood flowing through his veins. And that Dean was bleeding and unconscious, and in no way fit to make a swift escape.

“Hey!” the man hovering over Dean exclaimed when he realised what Castiel had done. In a flurry of activity, the man was joined by a tall, dark-skinned woman, and the two of them quickly removed Dean from the blood-letting device.

Frustrated glares were aimed in his direction as more people arrived to clean the mess he’d made. Eventually, however, the traffic in their little cubicle died down and only the first man remained.

“It is imperative that Dean and I leave now. You will administer the sugar he needs to regain consciousness,” Castiel demanded as he swung his legs over the side of his bed. He considered asking for clothing as well, but it seemed that everyone here was dressed in sleepwear, so there was really no point.

The man gawked at him. “It doesn’t work that way,” he sputtered. “The sugar is for after he wakes up, and in any case, your friend isn’t responding. He should have come around by now.”

Castiel’s frown deepened. He could see Dean’s chest rising and falling with his steady breaths, and the pulse at his throat was visibly strong. The man was right – there was no reason why Dean should not be awake by now. It would seem Dean was being obstinate in refusing to wake up.

He didn’t have time for this. His skin crawled with the certainty that their window for escape was rapidly closing. Praying that the angels had left him with his basic defences intact, Castiel raised his hand, gently tapping the stranger’s forehead with two fingers. As he’d hoped, the man dropped instantly, crumpling to the floor before he could call out for help.

Feeling hopeful, Castiel reached across to the adjacent cot and tapped Dean on the forehead. Sadly, his good fortune had come to an end; his attempt to transport them to a place of safety had failed. His shoulders fell as if a great weight had been laid across them. They were going to have to do this the hard way.

Castiel slid off the bed, landing barefoot on the cold laminate floor. The cotton gown they had dressed him in gaped open down the front, which was most disagreeable, so he made do by wrapping himself toga-style in the blanket with which they had covered him.

His damaged leg ached horribly, but it was holding up under his weight. The question was whether it would hold up under the combined weight of both him and Dean. It was a struggle he was doomed to lose. For a brief moment, Castiel had managed to lift Dean from his cot, but the fire in his leg forced him to relinquish his hold on the other man. He needed another option.

Hobbling over to the curtain, Castiel stuck his head out of the cubicle long enough to get a sense of the room’s layout. It was chaos out there, and that was something that would work in his favour. A quick scan revealed a folded wheelchair leaning against the wall opposite – all he had to do was retrieve it without being detected.

He recalled what Dean had once told him about going unnoticed: the trick was to display absolute confidence. People will automatically assume your actions are above board if you give them no reason to think otherwise. It was a deception that Castiel found distasteful, but was useful under the circumstances, nevertheless.

Striding out of his cubicle with a purposeful limp, Castiel headed directly for the wheelchair. No one batted an eye in his direction as he unfolded it and wheeled it directly back to the cubicle again. His heart pounded in his chest as adrenalin rushed through his body. It had been far easier than he’d anticipated. But there was still need of more deception, and it was vital that he remain composed.

With the same feigned confidence, Castiel levered Dean into the wheelchair and pushed him through the maze of cubicles and desks that made up the hospital’s Emergency Room. He received a few odd looks as he headed for the door, but he was careful not to meet anyone’s gaze. Unbelievably, no one stopped him as he pushed the wheelchair through the sliding doors leading outside. No alarms were raised. No men in uniforms came running after them in pursuit. It appeared as though they had managed to escape unnoticed, just as Dean would have predicted.

However, now that they were outside, there was the minor issue of what he was supposed to do now. He was barefoot and half naked, pushing an unconscious man in a wheelchair. They would not get far in that condition no matter how confident Castiel appeared. And with demons and angels honing in on their location, escaping on foot was foolhardy at best and suicidal at worst.

Dean had a car. He was fuzzy on a lot of things, but of that he was certain. Dean had a car, and his fondness for the vehicle was bordering on unnatural. It was black and large, if Castiel remembered correctly.

He kept walking as he scoped the cars parked in the lot next to the building. As soon as he saw the car, he knew he’d found the right one. It was sleek and polished to a mirror shine; black and monstrous next to the compact vehicles surrounding it. He aimed the wheelchair towards the car and picked up his pace just as he heard a woman shouting behind him.

“That’s him right there!” A quick glance over his shoulder confirmed that his absence had not gone entirely unnoticed. The tall, dark-skinned woman he’d seen earlier was pointing in his direction, and a burly man in a security uniform was staring directly at him.

Castiel sprinted the last few yards to the car, banging the wheelchair into the passenger door when he failed to stop in time. He cringed inwardly at the long scratch the chair had left in the black paint, instinctively knowing that it was a bad thing he’d done, and that Dean would not be pleased with him.

Dean’s jacket pocket yielded a set of keys that looked promising, and Castiel was relieved to find that one of them did, indeed, fit into the door’s lock. Castiel unceremoniously heaved Dean into the passenger seat, slamming the door shut before skirting around the front of the car to get in on the opposite side.

His splinted leg was nearly his undoing. The contraption that was meant to hold his bones in place was so bulky that it hindered his attempts to get into the car. With no time to remove the splint, Castiel did the next best thing and left his foot dangling out the open door. He fumbled with the keys before finding the right one to start the engine. Vague recollections of watching Dean drive sprang helpfully into his head, instructing him to turn the key and put the car in reverse.

The pedals at his feet proved a mystery at first, and he nearly backed into a parked car before determining that the pedal on the left arrested the car’s progress.

From there, it was relatively simple. The machine was designed logically, and his body seemed to have a muscle-memory when it came to steering it. He found that other drivers along the town’s streets gave him a wide berth, as if sensing his desire to move quickly through traffic.

Without a particular destination in mind, Castiel drove steadily westward, figuring that eventually he would reach the outskirts of town. And once they were out of town, he would put as much distance between them and the hospital as he  
possibly could until they either ran out of gas or found a safe place to hole up.

It wasn’t long before they ended up on a long, deserted strip of highway, and Castiel was able to coax the car up to its maximum speed. Through the open door, Castiel could see beyond his splinted foot to the road beneath them as it blurred past in an almost hypnotic way. It was an overcast night, and there was so little light to guide them that Castiel almost missed the narrow dirt road that branched off the highway, disappearing into a tangled arch of overhanging trees. The brakes squealed in protest as he made the sharp turn at a speed that was probably unsafe.  
He was forced to reduce his speed along the rutted, overgrown road, or risk damaging the underside of the car. Several roads branched off in both directions, most of them little more than two narrow tracks of mud snaking off into the blackness. Castiel chose one at random, creeping down the dirt track as branches thwacked and scraped at the windows and doors on either side of the car. More than once, he feared the ruts and bumps might be too much for the vehicle to handle, but they soldiered on until they at last came upon a clearing in the foliage.

It was a dead end. In front of them stood a quaint summer cottage with bleach-white aluminum siding and a tidy front porch. No light emanated from the dwelling, and from the looks of the driveway, it had been a long time since anyone had visited the place. It was by no means the safest place on Earth, but it would do for now.

Castiel turned off the ignition and faced the unconscious Dean Winchester for the first time since leaving the hospital behind.

“What am I going to do with you?” he asked his silent passenger. As he’d expected, the man didn’t answer him. Castiel sighed and mentally prepared himself to drag the man’s dead weight up to the little cottage.

His energy reserves were running dangerously low, and as he took a moment to close his eyes and recharge, he startled himself with a sudden recollection of when he’d first woken up in the hospital. Like a slap to the face, he remembered with absolute clarity hearing Dean’s voice inside his head as he was waking up. For reasons he could no longer recall, Castiel must have drawn Dean into his mind, and now he was trapped in there.

Knowing now what he had to do to bring Dean back, Castiel cleared his mind of all thoughts of danger and pursuit, and allowed himself to relax into a meditative state. His breathing gradually shallowed out, and soon he felt the car and the cool night air melt away. When he opened his eyes again, he found himself looking directly up into Dean’s face.  
His head was cradled in the man’s lap, and the hand running through his hair stilled as Dean realised Castiel had awakened. Castiel wondered at the redness in the other man’s eyes, and the parade of emotions that crossed over his face as he stared mutely back at him.

“Where the hell have you been? You son of a bitch!” Dean barked at him out of the blue.

A surge of doubt nearly crippled Castiel. This was the man who had cost him Heaven? The one who had made him turn his back on his brothers?

And then two fat tears rolled down from Dean’s puffy red eyes. “I thought I lost you.”

A relieved smile tugged at Castiel’s lips.

“Asshole,” Dean added, gruffly rubbing the tears away with his free hand.

Castiel’s smile broadened as a floodgate opened and his memories returned in a torrent. How could he ever have forgotten this man?

 

 

Chapter 4

 

“What are you smiling about?” Dean griped half-heartedly. The truth was, just seeing Cas staring up at him after he’d been all but lifeless in his lap for what seemed like an endless amount of time had been enough for him to forgive and forget, but he had a reputation to defend, here.

“I apologise if I frightened you, Dean. I assure you it was unintentional.”

With no warning whatsoever, the daylight disappeared. Dean blinked his eyes to adjust to the sudden darkness, and before long he could clearly make out the Impala’s interior. He was in the passenger seat, and next to him sat Castiel, his expressive eyes betraying a mix of guilt and concern.

Dean straightened out in the seat, his eyes darting everywhere at once. The last thing he remembered was being in the Emergency Room giving blood. He had no idea how long he’d been trapped inside the Outer Limits of Castiel’s mind, but it had obviously been a long time. Long enough for the angel to hijack him and his car and take them for a joyride. And since when did angel’s drive, anyway? Did Cas even know how to drive? Why hadn’t he just snapped his fingers and transported them to Sam or Bobby or somewhere else nice and safe?

“Do you still keep hex bags in the trunk of your car?” Castiel asked.

Dean nodded. “Of course. Never leave home without ‘em.”

Castiel let out an uncharacteristic sigh of relief and let his head fall back against the seat. It was only then that Dean truly looked at the angel. His eye was still swollen shut, and his leg was still splinted and sticking out the open door. Dean groaned inwardly at the thought of the angel driving his car like that, and hoped he’d at least had the good sense to use the seatbelt.

“Hey, are you okay?” Dean asked, unable to resist placing a comforting hand on the man’s shoulder.

Castiel rolled his head along the back of the seat to face him in the chilly darkness of the car. For a moment he just sat there, studying Dean’s face as if assessing whether or not he could handle the truth. Dean returned his gaze steadily, doing his best to look unshakable.

“I am not ‘okay’,” Castiel admitted at last and rolled his head away to stare up at the Impala’s ceiling. “There was an…altercation earlier today. Zachariah tracked me to Red River, and he didn’t come alone. He said that they had been too easy on me, and that if I didn’t hand you over immediately, they would cut me off from Heaven completely. I refused.”

Dean swallowed, his eyes wide in the darkness as he realised it was angels, not demons, which he’d seen earlier in Castiel’s mind. “Zachariah did this to you? So help me, I’m gonna kill that son of a bitch!” Dean growled.

“Not just him. He may have been the one who delivered the sentence, but it was the remainder of my garrison that delivered my punishment. In their eyes, I am no longer one of them. I believe it was their intention to leave me in the mud to die a brief, agonising death like the mortals I chose to defend.” The angel turned again to face him, an inexpressible sense of loss emanating from him. “I was not meant to survive, Dean. I should have died from the injuries they inflicted upon me.”

His brow wrinkled up in a frown as Dean tried to work out what Cas was trying to tell him. “What are you saying? Are you telling me the only reason you’re alive is because that douche bag Zach missed some of your mojo when he was cleaning up shop?”

“It is difficult to explain. I am still an angel, Dean – I still have my Grace. It is only by my choice or by the will of God that it can be stripped from me. But without the support of my brothers and sisters, I am limited to what energy can be safely stored in this vessel. Our… ‘mojo’, as you call it, is communal in nature. With the angels actively closing ranks against me, I have no access to the powers of Heaven.”

“So then, you’re like a battery that needs recharging?” Dean suggested with a smirk. Castiel didn’t seem to find it funny, though, so he quickly shifted gears. “So if you’re tapped out of angel juice, then how is it you didn’t die back there?”

The angel’s expression became suddenly hooded, and Dean knew there was something Cas wasn’t telling him. Suddenly, the darkness beyond the driver’s side window held a new fascination for Castiel, who remained resolutely silent and refused to look at Dean.

“Cas?” Dean prodded. “Anything you wish to share with the class?”

Castiel cast a quick glance in his direction and then away again before finally shifting uncomfortably in his seat. “I have a theory,” he said elusively, nervously rubbing the back of his neck as he continued to avoid making eye contact with Dean.

Dean waited, but it seemed that was as much as Castiel was willing to dole out for the moment. Too tired to bother pushing the matter, Dean changed the subject. “Fine; if you’re gonna be that way about it. We need to get back on the road; Sammy is pinned down at a bar in Red River and those dirt devils are hot on his ass. He needs our help.”  
Dean climbed out of the car and was about to head around to the driver’s side when he saw it. “Cas? What the hell! What’d you do to my car?” Even in the dim moonlight he could clearly see the scrapes and dents along the side of his precious Impala.

Castiel’s head popped up over the roof of the car; the toga-wearing angel looking at him wide-eyed as he gingerly pulled himself up onto his feet. The innocent ‘who, me?’ expression on his face was not fooling Dean, though. He scowled back at him, and then made a thorough inspection of his baby’s paint job as he made his way around to the other side. Wisely, Cas chose to limp his way around the car in the opposite direction. In his head, Dean attempted to squelch his anger by slowly counting to ten as he waited for Castiel to remove his splint and climb into the passenger seat. He kept telling himself that the angel’s intentions had been good, but even so…nobody messed with the Impala. Cas was just lucky Dean wasn’t the kind of guy who kicked a dog when it was down, otherwise the angel would have a Dean-sized boot lodged up his ass right now.

Starting the car, Dean looked over at his passenger, about to demand directions back to the highway, but the words died on his lips when his eyes fell on Castiel. His face was ashen and covered in a fine sheen of sweat, and he was shivering so hard his teeth were clacking. Add to that the pinched brows and the shallow breathing and it was pretty obvious that Cas was in a great deal of pain and being stubbornly stoic about it. The frightening thought occurred to Dean that maybe Cas wasn’t out of the woods just yet, and Dean couldn’t risk taking him back out on the road without checking him out first.

Dean turned off the ignition and yanked the key out. They kept a well-stocked first aid kit in the trunk, and Cas had found them a nice little hideaway to use as a makeshift clinic. Ignoring the other man’s confused gaze, Dean slipped out of the car and popped the trunk. He dug through a pile of stakes and knives until his fingers felt the smooth, cold metal of the first aid kit. By the time he’d freed it from its resting place and pocketed some of the ready-made hex bags he also kept in the trunk, Castiel had opened his door and was attempting to get out of the car.

“Hold up, Cas. Let me give you a hand,” Dean said, tucking the kit under one arm offering the other to help ease his friend back out of the Impala.

“I thought you said Sam needed our help,” Castiel stated.

“Yeah, well it looks like you need more help than he does at the moment,” Dean replied, expecting the angel to get all defensive and protest. But instead, Castiel looked up at him with such unbridled gratitude that it hit Dean like a sucker punch to the gut.

Dean hovered over the angel, wondering what the etiquette was on physical contact – he wanted to give the guy some support, but there was so much…skin. Smooth and pale in the darkness, Castiel looked more otherworldly than he ever had before; like a statue carved out of alabaster. Of course, the toga didn’t help to dispel the impression in any way.

Settling on just sticking close in case Cas needed his help, Dean led the way up to the cottage’s front porch, where he squatted in front of the door to pick the lock. It took longer than it should have because of the near-absolute darkness, but at last the tumblers snicked into place and the knob turned effortlessly in his hand. He stood up just in time to see Castiel take a nose dive in the direction of the porch steps.

Luckily, his hunter’s reflexes kicked in and he was able to catch Castiel before he hit the ground, but it was a near thing. “Damn stubborn angel,” Dean mumbled, as he struggled to drag him over the threshold into the inky black cottage.

A few steps in Dean barked his shin on something low and sharp and guessed by its proximity to the door that it was one of those bench seat thingies that the cottage crowd loved so much. Hoping he was right, Dean hefted Castiel over it and eased him down. He didn’t topple to the floor, so Dean considered it a victory, and went off in search of a light source. A quick grope of the wall proved fruitful, and with a flip of a light switch, the little cottage came to life with the flicker of generator-powered lamps. From the struggling hum of the protesting generator Dean had a feeling they wouldn’t have lights for long.

Placing the first aid kit on the floor at his feet, Dean turned his attention back to Cas, who was conscious, but was slumped against the wall looking like he desperately wished he wasn’t. Fresh blood trickled down from the long cut on his forehead and dripped from his eyebrow, leaving bright red spatters on the sheet draped around him.

“Jesus, Cas. You’re a mess, you know that?” said Dean as he kneeled in front of him to get a closer look. Cas was well enough to cast him an annoyed glare, at least, Dean noticed.

It was a bit unnerving the way Castiel kept his eyes glued on him while Dean carefully removed the bloodied hospital sheet. If it had been Sammy, Dean would have just yanked it off and tossed it away so he could help stitch up whatever needed stitching, but with Cas… Dean swallowed hard as he realised the angel had nothing on under the thin hospital gown, and it was gaping open all the way down to his navel, leaving very little to the imagination. Not that Dean had ever imagined what Cas looked like naked. Except for that one time, when it was really hot and the sight of the angel looking all cool as a cucumber in his trench coat made Dean want to forcefully rip the clothes off him. That incident had caused his mind to take an entirely inappropriate detour; one that he’d be smart not to take again, especially under these circumstances.

The lights did a slow fade before flickering back on again, and Dean knew he had to be quick. With the angel still staring at him intently, Dean untied the gown and pushed it off Cas’ shoulders, allowing the mint-green garment to pool around his hips. The sudden exposure caused them both to shudder, albeit for different reasons, and Dean felt his face heating up. All thoughts of modesty flew out the window, however, when Dean spotted the large, black bruise covering Castiel’s entire right flank. He gently pressed his fingers against it, and Cas’ responding shout was so loud it made Dean’s ears ring. If Cas’ mojo had still been intact, Dean had no doubt the little cottage would have been window-free after that last outburst.

“Internal bleeding,” Dean cursed. Knife wounds, bullet wounds; anything would have been better news. There was nothing Dean could do except cross his fingers and hope that he could get Cas back to the hospital in time to save his life.

“No, Dean,” Cas replied, as if he’d read his mind. And maybe he had, for all Dean knew. “We cannot go back. Before we left the hospital, I sensed the approach of several demons. They will be looking for us.”

“Well I’m not gonna just leave you here,” Dean protested. “There’s gotta be something we can do.”

Castiel shook his head, his eyes squinching tight against the pain. “It will leave me almost entirely drained, but I believe I may be able to heal, given enough time. You should leave me here and return to your brother.” His good eye rolled open and fixed on Dean’s face, his expression packed with guilt. “I will be of little use to you from now on, Dean. For that I am sorry.”

A flash of anger sparked inside Dean, remembering all too well the words Cas used to describe himself in the future; all but useless, powerless, hopeless... There was no way Dean was going to let that particular future play out. Not if he had anything to say about it.

“Nuh-uh, Cas. The pity party stops right here.” Dean grabbed hold of the angel’s shoulders and looked him square in the eye. “I don’t care if you can’t zap us back to Kansas or fillet a demon with a touch of your finger: you’re one of us now, you got that? And we stick together no matter what. So no more doom and gloom talk, understood?”

Castiel nodded, tight-lipped, and slowly slumped forward in Dean’s grasp, his forehead coming to rest on Dean’s shoulder. The sudden proximity sent a jolt through Dean and he fought the knee-jerk reaction to shove the angel away. With his arms now awkwardly supporting his shivering, half-naked friend, Dean ironically raised his eyes to Heaven and begged for strength. If this was some kind of test, he had the nasty suspicion he was going to fail. Big time.

The generator chugged a few times and the lights dimmed again. “Thank-you,” Dean muttered, taking it as a sign that he needed to get his head out of the gutter and get a move on. He quickly scanned the cottage’s living area and saw that the owners had left the place with a nice, dry stack of wood and kindling next to the fireplace. The sofa facing it was a hideous floral pattern, but it looked comfortable enough and there was a thick afghan folded neatly over the back of it. With renewed purpose, Dean hoisted Castiel to his feet and half-dragged him over to the couch. He desperately tried to ignore the fact that the hospital gown didn’t make the journey with them, and he carefully averted his eyes as he arranged Cas on the cushions, quickly covering him up with the blanket.

Dean shook his head at the ceiling, sure now that the mixed signals were some kind of cosmic joke.

The coughing generator reminded him that he was fighting the clock, and Dean busied himself with starting a fire in the fireplace. Within a minute he had the logs placed and the kindling lit, and the flames were just beginning to lick their way up towards the split logs when the generator finally gave up the ghost.

When he turned around, he saw that Castiel was asleep. Or meditating. Or comatose, for all he knew. The angel’s head was tilted at an uncomfortable angle, and as Dean gently propped his head up with a throw pillow, he felt a pang of something deep in his chest. Concern, he told himself. That’s all it was.

There was nothing to do now but wait and worry.

 

 

Chapter 5

 

The jangle of heavy metal music erupting from his jacket pocket startled him. He didn’t need to see the call display to know it was Sammy. Dean flipped open the phone and braced himself for the inevitable smack-down.

“Where the hell are you, Dean?” his brother demanded over the phone.

“I don’t know, exactly,” he answered truthfully.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“We’re in a cottage somewhere. It’s a long story.”

“Well you need to get your ass back here. Now! We’ve already lost half a dozen people, and the guns are barely slowing these things down.”

Dean rubbed a hand over his face. “What do you want me to do, Sammy? I can’t get to you right now, and even if I could, I wouldn’t be able to fight them off by myself.”

“What about Castiel?”

“Cas is out of commission. He took one hell of a beating, and frankly, I’m not even sure if he’s gonna make it.” Dean rubbed a hand over his face and sighed. He hated that there was nothing he could do for either Castiel or his brother, and from the constant sound of gunfire in the background, it sounded like Sam needed all the help he could get. “Look. Just do the best you can to lock the place down. Seal everything off and keep everyone together. All you have to do is hold them off ‘til sunrise.”

A high-pitched scream filtered through the cell phone’s ear-piece before the connection was severed, and Dean winced. He could only assume the death count had just risen to seven, and he hoped Sam had enough gun power to buy them the time they needed.

Snapping his phone shut and stowing it in his pocket again, Dean returned to his angel babysitting duties. Castiel hadn’t budged an inch, and from a distance it was hard to tell if he was even breathing. But upon closer inspection, Dean could see the gentle rise and fall of his chest and that was enough set his mind at ease. For now, at least. The truth was, he wouldn’t breathe easy himself until Cas was back to his usual dead-pan, trench coat-wearing self.

Throughout the night, Dean fussed over the fire, stoking it and adding logs when needed. And every once in a while he would check on Cas, making sure he didn’t get too hot or too cold, and fretting over the clamminess of his skin. He was well aware of the fact that he’d never acted like this with anyone else. Even with his own brother, near-mortal wounds were shrugged off with a well-meaning ‘suck it up, Princess’ and a token pat on the shoulder. Maybe it was because Cas was so new to the whole ‘being human’ thing or because there was no one else in Heaven or on Earth – literally – in whom the angel could trust; but Dean couldn’t bear to see him like this, and he found his concern confusing as hell.

By the time the first weak rays of sunlight kissed the horizon, Dean’s eyes were red and sore from the wood smoke and the lack of sleep. He hadn’t heard back from Sam, and he’d been trying to convince himself that it was only because his brother was too busy to give him a call. But the mud army should have fallen with the rising of the sun, and every second that passed without hearing from Sam was making his stomach twist. Finally, Dean couldn’t take the suspense any longer and he took out his cell phone.

Sam answered on the sixth ring – like he was intentionally trying to torture Dean by keeping him in suspense – and the sound of his voice on the other end was music to his ears. They’d lost another four people at the bar before stumbling onto the discovery that water made the creatures lose their shape for a while, giving them a fighting chance. They’d pretty much depleted the bar’s supply of beer and soda on tap, but they’d managed to avoid an all-out slaughter, so the bar’s owner wasn’t complaining. Much. Now Sam and the rest of the survivors were sweeping out the muddy remains of the demon army and tending to the wounded. Dean promised he’d be there as soon as he could, and hung up.

 

***

 

Long before he opened his eyes, Castiel could sense Dean’s presence nearby. He could also sense the man’s nervous tension, and the fact that the fireplace was no longer the only source of light in the room. He was still far from healed, but he was fairly certain he was well enough to travel now, and that would have to be good enough. People were depending on them.

The bright sunlight sent shards of pain through his retinas when he finally resigned himself to open his eyes. Dean was in his face almost instantly, looking anxious and irritable, but Castiel knew him well enough now to understand that what he was actually feeling was concern. Concern for Sam and for a town full of terrified people fighting a battle they were unlikely to win. Maybe some of that concern was even being sent in his direction. He could only pray that he ranked high enough in Dean’s favour for such to be the case. Castiel had received an unusual and unexpected revelation the previous evening, and a great deal was riding on an assumption that Castiel could not prove. With his powers completely drained from a night’s worth of healing, he no longer had the strength to even so much as glimpse into Dean’s mind for reassurance.

“Welcome back. It’s about time,” Dean grumbled, but his eyes flashed painfully when they locked momentarily with Castiel’s. It was likely to be the only demonstration of Dean’s concern that Castiel was going to receive, so he decided to make do with it. “You feeling any better? ‘Cause I gotta say, you still look like shit.”

Castiel grunted with the effort of shifting on the couch. He didn’t even have the energy to lift himself into a sitting position on his own, though, so he settled for simply adjusting his pillow. “I was able to stem the internal bleeding and heal my life-threatening injuries,” he replied. “I will be alright to travel, now.”

Dean looked down at him sceptically, and Castiel hastily drew the blanket up to his chin to hide the disturbingly dark bruising that spread over much of his torso. With his Grace weakened to the brink of non-existence, Castiel was feeling every one of those bruises, but they were nothing compared with the jagged, knifing pain in his chest that he felt with every breath or the tight, hot thrum of pain in his recently broken leg. His head pounded in time with his heartbeat, and the pressure behind his eyes made him long for unconsciousness. Despite everything, he knew Dean was relying on him to help them save Red River, and he’d do everything in his power not to let him down. Wincing and hissing, Castiel inched around on the couch until he was sitting upright, the blanket still clutched tightly against his throat. The effort left him shaky and covered with a clammy sweat.

“Don’t get me wrong, Cas, but you look worse than you did last night. Maybe you should sit this one out. I’ll leave you with some hex bags and come back for you after Sammy and I take care of the mulch men.”

“No!” Castiel protested heatedly. From the shocked look on his face, Dean was as surprised by Castiel’s outburst as he was himself. “You will not be able to defeat the army without the presence of an angel,” he added weakly.

“Have you seen yourself lately?” Dean shot back a little harshly. “You can’t even sit up straight. How do you think you’ll be able to fend off an entire army of demon mud-men?”

Castiel hung his head. Dean was right, of course; in his current condition, he was more of a hindrance than a help. Emotions were tearing at him from all directions, each one new and strange and sharp-edged, vying for his attention. Before, emotions had always been an abstract concept: he understood them in theory, and even experienced them in a dulled, distant sort of way. But this… His feeling of guilt was the strongest – a constant drumbeat, sometimes soft, other times deafening – and piled on top of it was a cacophony of fear, hope, desperation, sadness, love and grief. They clogged his throat and stung at his eyes with their intensity.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hey there,” said Dean gently, sliding low into Castiel’s line of vision, tilting his chin up with a knuckle. “Don’t get all weepy on me, Cas. If it means that much to you, you can come along for the ride.”

The flood of relief was staggering. It drowned out everything else, leaving a tremulous smile in its wake, even as he blinked away his unshed tears. He had no idea how humans were able to function so well while constantly being harangued by their emotions. But if Castiel was right, and the revelation he had received had been authentic, then he needed to trust that he was on the correct path. He needed to ‘go with the flow’ as Dean would say, and allow himself to experience everything to the fullest. The fate of the world depended on Castiel’s ability to pass this test. And on Dean.

 

***

 

At Castiel’s insistence, Dean left money and a note of thanks on the dining table for the people who owned the cabin where they’d crashed for the night. Castiel had also added his own note (written in a script that was so ornate as to be nearly illegible), thanking the man of the house for unwittingly sparing an outfit for him to wear. Dean wasn’t so sure he’d be giving thanks if he was in Cas’ place. He’d purposely rifled through the bedroom closet and chosen the oldest, most threadbare pair of jeans and a red and black chequered lumber jacket with two missing buttons and a gaping tear in the right breast pocket. The guy looked like a hobo who’d just been pushed off a moving train.

Dean didn’t know what was up with Castiel, but whatever was going on with him, it was totally unnerving. If he never saw tears in Cas’ eyes again, it would be too soon. And the mood swings! One minute he’d be all terse and stand-offish, and the next he’d be all clingy and pulling out the big ole puppy-dog eyes. Dean figured it had to do with him being bullied out of the playground by his angel buddies, but that didn’t help him understand how to deal with him.  
One thing was certain – Castiel was in a helluva lot of pain, and it was clearly something he wasn’t used to, no matter how brave he pretended to be. Dean had been on the receiving end of more than a few beatings in his life, but he’d developed a tolerance to pain over time. Cas was like a toddler who’d just discovered what happens when you touch a hot stove. It was pain and surprise and betrayal all rolled into one, and it hurt Dean almost as much to witness it.

Dean force-fed the broken angel a fistful of mega-strength painkillers from the first aid kit and managed to bundle him into the Impala with minimal jostling and cries of pain. The drive back to the highway was another story entirely, however. Every bump on the dirt road made Castiel whimper pathetically, and Dean winced in sympathy after every single one. Thankfully, the pain pills kicked in not long after their wheels hit smooth pavement, and Cas drifted off to sleep with his face smooshed against the window.

It turned out that Castiel had driven much farther than Dean had anticipated. It was easy enough to turn around and head back to Red River, but it would be a good forty-five minute drive. The sun was already high in the sky, burning off the thin clouds that had blanketed the bleak countryside for the last three days. It was going to be warm. Maybe even hot. At this rate, the chance of there being a downpour to wash away the mud army was looking pretty slim. Once again, fate was spitting in their coffee cups when they weren’t looking.

They were entering the outskirts of Red River when Dean saw it. The devastation was far worse than anything he’d have thought possible. Mud caked every building and every car in sight. It was like the town had been buried in an avalanche of dirt and debris. Some of the smaller structures like garages and sheds and some of the older barns had been levelled, and as they drove past a flattened farm house, Dean could see large muddy lumps dotting the adjacent field. One of the lumps moved a bit, and he realised that the lumps were cows, all but one of them dead – smothered to death by a blanket of earth. With a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach, Dean now grasped the true horror of what his brother and the townsfolk had been dealing with. The mud creatures attacked by encasing their victims, slowly suffocating them in an inescapable shroud or earth. It would be like being buried alive – something with which Dean had personal experience and wouldn’t wish on his worst enemy.

As he kept driving through town, it became clear that the army had cut a swath of destruction right through the heart of the community towards the Red Barn Tavern where most of the townsfolk had taken refuge. Dean tried not to think about what might have become of anyone unlucky enough to get in their way. With any luck, the muck-men didn’t bother snacking before their big meal.

The Red Barn was almost unrecognisable. Dean knew by the general shape of the building and the outrageous number of cars parked around it that it was the same place he’d left only one night before, but it looked like it had been hit by a mudslide. The walls were caked so thick with dirt that you couldn’t even tell where the door was. The roof was nearly buckling under the weight of all the mud on top of it. It was a blessing that the stuffy bar had no windows, or the people trapped inside would never have survived the night.

Dean drove another block and a half before parking the car. He’d seen the mess that had become of the vehicles in the bar’s parking lot, and he’d be damned if he was going to subject the Impala to that kind of abuse. Dean turned in his seat, planning on nudging Castiel awake, but the look of utter peace on the angel’s face made him pause. He lost track of how long he sat there, simply looking at him, but he was certain it was longer than was appropriate. As soon as he realised his eyes were glued to Cas’ lips – studying the curves and the way they were slightly parted – Dean knew he was losing his mind.

He cleared his throat. Loudly. When that failed to wake up Castiel, he rolled his eyes and gave the angel’s shoulder a soft shake. “Hey, dude, wake up.”

Castiel’s eyelids fluttered open and a pair of sleep-baffled blue eyes blinked back at him. “Are we there yet?” Cas asked.

Dean couldn’t help but smile. Castiel had been around since the dawn of time – literally – and yet he still managed to pull off a child-like innocence when it came to everyday life. It stirred something in Dean that should have been parental, but wasn’t. Not by a long shot.

Dean cleared his throat again, rubbing his neck to cover the blush he felt creeping up to his face. “Yeah, we’re here, sleepy-head. Think you can manage to walk a block or two?”

“I will be fine, Dean,” Castiel replied, glaring and pursing his lips as if daring him to suggest otherwise.

“Okey-dokey, then,” Dean said, tearing his gaze away from Castiel.

It took all his willpower to stand back and allow Cas to drag himself out of the Impala and take his first faltering steps on his own. As soon as Dean was convinced the angel wasn’t going to topple over, he walked on ahead. He was not going to give in to the impulse to take Castiel by the arm and guide him to the Red Barn like some kind of weird-assed prom date.

Castiel was still half a block from the bar by the time Dean reached the front entrance – or where the front entrance would be if he could find it through all the dirt. He remembered Sammy telling him that they were sweeping the mud out of the bar, but they definitely weren’t sweeping it out through this door. It stood to reason, then, that there must be a back or side entrance. A quick peek around the side of the building revealed a heavy, metal door next to a large dumpster. It was propped open with a sturdy wooden chair, and as he watched, a burly-looking man in a filthy wife-beater appeared in the entrance, bearing a bulging garbage bag. The man had beady eyes and a buzz cut, and the look he gave Dean was pure malice.

Dean gave the man his best ‘hey, let’s be friends’ smile. “Hey, there. You wouldn’t happen to know if there’s a guy named Sam inside? He’s tall; like, Sasquatch tall, and he really needs a haircut.”

The man’s scowl dialled down a notch, and he went about dumping his trash. “Yeah, I know the guy. Saved our asses in there, last night. You Dean?” he asked.

Dean’s smile broadened, thinking that Sam had paved the way for him, but Mr. Burly cut him off before he could answer.

“’Cause if you’re Dean, you might want to rethink coming any closer. There’s a few folks in there that are some pissed at you.” Mr. Burly crossed his thickly muscled arms over his thickly muscled chest and squinted at him.  
Luckily for Dean, that was the moment Castiel chose to round the corner looking for him. Even though Dean knew a strong wind could knock the angel flat on his ass, he still somehow managed to look menacing. Sure, he was bruised and messed up, but the ‘tude screamed ‘you should see the other guy’.

“Dean, is there a problem?” Castiel rumbled.

Mr. Burly’s eyes widened slightly and he actually backed up a step. “I ain’t got a problem,” he said. “Could have used you last night, is all.”

“Yeah, well, something important came up,” Dean retorted, feeling a bit cockier now.

Burly’s eyes darted from Dean to Castiel and back again before he dropped his arms and stepped to the side, leaving them room to get through the door. “Better come on in, then. We got a lot to do before nightfall.”

The contrast between bright sunlight and dingy bar light was enough to make Dean essentially blind when he entered the Red Barn Tavern. When his eyes adjusted, he found himself facing a bar full of frightened and filthy people, all of them looking at him as if he was their saviour. Only a handful of people ignored him and continued working to secure the building, using whatever they could to seal the chinks in the walls.

“Dean!” Sam squeezed his way through the crowd to get to him, and Dean was thankful that he didn’t look as pissed as he was expecting he would. “I was starting to worry,” he said, rubbing demon mud from his hands and onto the stained apron he was wearing. “Where’s Castiel?”

As if on cue, Castiel stumbled in through the open doorway, catching his foot on the lip of the door frame and colliding gracelessly into Dean’s back with a painful grunt.

“Dean, is that you?” Castiel asked with a hint of panic. “I believe I may have gone blind!”

“Relax, Cas. It’s just dark in here; you’re eyes will adjust in a minute,” Dean replied, reluctantly wrapping an arm around Castiel’s waist to keep the angel from doing any more damage to himself. He could feel his brother’s eyes drilling into him.

“What the hell happened to Castiel?” Sam asked bluntly.

“Zachariah, that’s what,” Dean growled in response and hefted Cas closer as if by doing so he could protect his friend from any future attack by that dick of an angel. “He and his pals have decided to play dirty.”

Sam came around the other side of Castiel and helped Dean haul the angel into a chair at one of the little bar tables. Castiel slumped forward onto his folded arms and in a few short seconds he was dead to the world.

“So I take it he won’t be working his mojo on the mud men tonight?” Sam asked in a lowered voice, so only Dean could hear.

Dean shook his head. “And if what Bobby told us about these guys, their numbers will keep multiplying as they march. We gotta try and keep them here: keep their numbers down until Cas recovers enough to fight.”

Sam’s eyes swept the room, taking in all the survivors and he frowned. “You can’t ask these people to stay. Dean, we barely made it through one night. They’re exhausted and scared, and they’re starting to get restless. Now the rest of the town has already cleared out, as far as I could tell when I did a supply run earlier, and word has already spread that they can outrun these things. I don’t think we can hold them here much longer.”

Dean eyed the bar patrons. Sam was right; their faces were filled with worry and doubt, and if Dean told them something they didn’t want to hear, he might have a revolt on his hands. But if they all left, there wouldn’t be any reason for the mud army to stay. They would pick up roots, literally, and march on to the next town, gathering more soldiers with every field they passed. If the army got too big, Castiel wouldn’t be able to work his magic on them, even at full strength. Both Sam and Dean, thinking along the same lines, cast their gaze towards Castiel, sleeping awkwardly at the tiny wooden table.

“Any ideas?” asked Sam, seemingly okay with handing the reigns over to Dean for once.

Without blinking, Dean offered the simplest solution he could think of. “We lie. We tell them I just came from the surrounding towns and they were even worse off. If they think they’re safer here, they won’t go anywhere. Then we stay. We fight.”

Sam looked like he was planning on protesting, but he obviously couldn’t think of another option, so he simply nodded in agreement. “Great. So who gets to break the bad news to them?”

Dean shrugged. “Rock, paper, scissors?” he suggested. This time Sammy was going to choose paper, he just knew it.

 

***

 

"Okay, listen up, everybody!” Dean tapped his finger on the microphone causing it to squeal in a fingernails-on-chalkboard kind of way. He was standing on the bar’s tiny stage wondering why, why, he kept choosing scissors. A moment later, he had the full attention of everyone left in the town of Red River. “You all know what’s going on out there, and I know some of you are thinking of making a run for it, but I’ve been driving all day, and I can assure you that Red River is the place you want to be. These things are everywhere, and the only way to stay alive is to stick together; there’s safety in numbers. Trust me.”

A doughy, middle-aged redhead with the glazed look of the recently traumatized let out a loud moan of despair and buried her face in the shoulder of the stout man beside her. The man stroked her hair soothingly as he voiced his opinion on the whole situation. “Me and Lorraine were gonna gas up and go – just keep driving until we run outta road. These things only come out at night, right?”

Several others murmured in agreement and there was a general shift in allegiances taking place in the room.

“Oh, you can try,” Dean said with a bitter sneer, “but you’ve only got another four or five hours until sunset. How far do you think you can go? I’m telling you, it won’t be far enough, and then you’ll be alone on the road when night falls and the ground comes to life all around you. You really willing to take that risk?”

Again, the room broke out into generalised murmuring, only this time, some of them were nodding at Dean and looking to him to tell them what to do next.

“We have enough time to seal this place up and get what we need to fight back before it gets dark. I can’t force you to stay, but I can honestly say that we’ll all be better off if we stick together,” Dean said, tweaking the truth more than a little.

“For how long?” The shouted question came from a tall, skinny guy in a hunting cap at the back of the room. He was gangly and awkward-looking, and Dean had the feeling he was too young to be in a place like this. And that’s when he noticed that the tall kid wasn’t the only one here who was underage. As he scoped the crowd for the first time, he spotted kids peppered throughout the group, tucked in close to their parents’ sides. It made sense: all those kids left with babysitters while their parents hung out at the bar had been gathered here in the aftermath. It made lying to these people all the harder, and Dean was just thankful that Cas was sleeping so he wouldn’t have to witness the deceit.

“As long as it takes for help to arrive,” Dean answered gravely. He knew that the only help they were likely to receive was from Castiel, and he had no idea how long it would be until the angel got enough strength back to send the dirt bastards back to the fields where they’d come from. “In the meantime, we need to hook up hoses to the water supply and finish boarding this place up.” He clapped his hands when they didn’t immediately jump to it, and the crowd slowly began drifting off to continue the work they’d been doing before he’d interrupted.

 

***

 

Sam took a long, satisfied glance around the Red Barn Tavern. The place was sealed up as best as they could manage with the materials and skills available to them. All of the holes that the mud army had ripped in the walls had been boarded up, as had the one tiny window in the kitchen. Garden hoses had been MacGyvered together with the kitchen and bathroom faucets so they could douse the bastards when they eventually broke through their defences.

As much as he hated to admit it, Sam had been grateful to hand over the reigns to Dean so he could catch an hour or two of sleep. And in that time, his brother had managed to organise the sad group of stragglers into a decently formidable force. Every spare surface was covered with bottles, jugs and containers all filled with water for easy access in battle, and he’d even managed to hunt down some super-soaker water pistols, which were being filled and distributed to people claiming to have the best aim.

Now it was just a waiting game. According to Sam’s watch, there was less than half an hour until nightfall and a hush had fallen over the clustered group of survivors. A few people had passed out from sheer exhaustion, but most were simply sitting quietly in safe little clutches, clinging to each other like waterlogged rats on a sinking ship.  
Sam finished his rounds, checking one last time to make sure everything was ready, and then his eyes searched out Dean. Not surprisingly, he found him practically nose to nose with Castiel in one of the dimly lit booths. They were talking sotto voce so as not to alarm the others, but Sam could tell by the set of his brother’s shoulders that whatever they were discussing was an urgent matter.

He slowly picked his way across the bar and squeezed into the booth next to Dean. Annoyingly, their conversation came to a dead stop as soon as he arrived, and judging from the tight-lipped frown on Castiel’s face, the silence was being enforced by Dean.

“What’s up, guys?” Sam asked, trying to keep it casual, despite the obvious tension. When no one answered, Sam gave his brother a warning glare. “Dean?”

Dean huffed and glowered first at Castiel and then at him. “You wanna know what’s up? I’ll tell you what’s up; Cas lost my pendant –“

“I didn’t lose it,” Castiel explained wearily. “It was ripped from my neck during battle.”

“-and now he says he needs to go find it,” Dean finished as if he hadn’t been interrupted. Dean crossed his arms and looked at Sam, clearly expecting him to take his side on this one.

Sam raised his eyebrows. “Cas, you do know that we’re about to come under attack, right?”

Castiel sighed and hung his head before fixing Sam with eyes flinty with determination. “As I was saying to Dean, I would have gone out sooner to search for it, but no one woke me until it was too late. I need that pendant.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” said Dean, “I want it back more than you do; but there’s no way in hell you’re leaving this bar until morning.”

“While I was unconscious, I remembered where it landed. It’s right outside next to the dumpster – it will only take a minute or two to find it,” Castiel argued.

Sam shook his head. “I have to go with Dean on this one, Cas. Even if you know where it fell, there was a demon dirt army out there trampling all over the place. What makes you think it’ll still be there?”

“I have to try. I have a theory, and I need that pendant to prove that I’m right. And if I’m right, then I may have just discovered how to restore my strength enough to defeat this army,” said Castiel, his blue eyes boring into Sam’s, willing him to change his mind. Sam squirmed in his seat, feeling uncomfortable under the angel’s determined glare. It was no contest – Sam caved long before the angel even needed to blink.

“Fine, if you really think it’ll help,” Sam conceded.

“Are you kidding me, Sammy?” Dean barked, raising a few concerned heads all around the bar. Lowering his voice to a menacing growl, Dean continued, “even if he did find it, there’s not enough time to do anything before the sun sets. It’s too dangerous – I don’t like it.”

“I’ll go with him; make sure we get back inside before the army wakes up, whether he’s found it or not,” Sam said, feeling the bristling tension starting up again.

Dean raised his hands in defeat, but the look on his face plainly stated that he was not happy about the decision.

Sam knew better than to press his luck any further, and he practically yanked the angel out of the booth after him in his attempt to prove they wouldn’t waste any time. Castiel glanced back over his shoulder once, worry etched into his features, before willingly trailing after him out the side door of the bar.

The security light over the entrance blinked on as they stepped out into the fading light of day. Sam watched as Castiel limped past him, heading towards the metal dumpster. From the looks of it, the angel was fighting just to stay upright, and as he doubled over to search through the mud and debris on the ground, Sam took pity on him and went over to help.

Even with the bright security light shining directly down on them, it was difficult to discern trash from potential treasure. Sam had picked up half a dozen bottle caps and an even larger number of likely-sized twigs before something faintly shiny caught his eye.

“Cas!” he called out, and trotted over to where the angel was sifting though a heap of dirt.

Castiel’s eyes lit up with relief as Sam rubbed the mud off the object, revealing it to be Dean’s missing amulet. They were both so caught up in the moment that neither of them noticed the sun slipping down past the line of the horizon.

 

 

Chapter 7

 

The first indication that they were neck deep in trouble was the shaking of the ground all around them. Castiel had just finished sliding Dean’s freshly cleaned pendant over his head when all hell broke loose. The mud and dirt under his borrowed shoes suddenly clung to him, sending spiralling fingers up his legs, and next to him, he could see that Sam was trying to shake off one of the mud-men, too.

Sam was having better luck than he was at the moment, making faster progress as they slogged their way back to the heavy metal door. With his leg screaming at him and his ribs sparking in white-hot shards of pain with every move, Castiel was beginning to wish he’d taken Dean’s advice to heart. He was still several feet from the door and being dragged rapidly backwards by the earth itself when Sam reached the bucket of water he’d placed by the bar’s entrance in case of emergency. Thankful that at least Sam would make it to safety, Castiel stopped struggling, hoping to provide an easier target and draw the demon soldiers away from Sam to buy him a few extra seconds.

Suddenly, Castiel found himself drenched in cold water. He spun his head around to see Sam holding the now-empty bucket in his hands and yelling at him to hurry. With the water loosening the soldier’s grasp on his legs, Castiel was able to break free and make a stumbling dash towards the door.

Sam wrenched the door open and shoved him inside, but he wasn’t following, and it was then that Castiel saw the extent to which the hunter was enveloped by the mud. It was well past his waist, and rapidly climbing the length of his tall frame. Worse yet, there were half a dozen more of the soldiers directly behind him.

“Just go, Cas! I’ve gotta close this door before they get inside!” Sam shouted, making it clear that he intended to be on the opposite side of the door when it closed.

There was no way that was going to happen. Before Sam could shut the door on him, Castiel got a two-handed grip on his arm and yanked with all his strength. Sam tumbled headlong into the bar, scrabbling on the floor and now nearly completely encased in mud. Castiel slammed the door shut just in time to keep a whole battalion of mud men at bay.  
Their noisy entrance alerted Dean, and he and a handful of others raced towards them with one of the hoses and several buckets of water. The mud, however, was already forcing itself down Sam’s throat, and they were not going to arrive in time to save him. Castiel was his only hope, now, and he could only pray that the creature hadn’t reached full strength and that he had enough power within him to kill it.

Mustering all his reserves, Castiel let loose one powerful blast of energy directly into the core of the mud soldier. In an instant, the mud burst into dust and ash, harmlessly flaking off of Sam and falling to the floor all around him. The over-taxing of his Grace had taken its toll, and Castiel could feel the darkness encroaching on his vision, but he managed to hold out long enough to hear Sam coughing, expelling the dirt that had gone down his throat. With the knowledge that he’d done everything in his power to save his friend, Castiel surrendered to unconsciousness and collapsed.

 

***

 

Dean stopped in his tracks, the water in his bucket sloshing over the rim and onto the dusty remains of the mud soldier on the floor. Sammy was hacking and coughing, which meant he was also able to breathe on his own, so Dean wasn’t too worried about him. Cas, on the other hand…

He saw the angel’s eyes roll up in his head, and he knew that he was going down. Unfortunately, Dean wasn’t close enough to catch him in time and Castiel crumpled to the floor, limp as a puppet with its strings cut.

“Dammit, Cas,” Dean muttered as he handed his bucket of water to the guy standing next to him. He knelt down next to the angel and checked to make sure he was breathing. Thankfully, he was, but he was also bleeding from his ears, nose and mouth, and that was never a good sign.

Outside, the howling of the mud army began in earnest. It reminded Dean of a documentary he’d once seen on howler monkeys, only these guys were much louder and the noise was accompanied by multiple thuds and bangs as they hammered against the walls to get inside.

“Help me get him into that booth over there,” Dean barked at a young man who was just standing there watching. The man snapped to, following Dean’s orders like a well-trained cadet under a drill sergeant. Together they carried Castiel over to the nearest booth and stretched him out along one of the vinyl benches. Not really caring about collateral damage, Dean proceeded to rip out the heavy wooden table that was taking up most of the room in the little cubicle. Without being asked, the young man gave him a hand, prying the bolted table out of the booth and then dragging it away to help reinforce the back door. Dean had just taken a seat opposite Castiel when Sam arrived at his side, still coughing up dust.

Dean could feel his brother watching him, judging his mood and deciding whether or not it was safe to start a conversation. He was not in the mood to hear whatever it was Sam had to say, so Dean studiously ignored him and continued to stare at Cas. The bar was silent, save for the pounding and hollering of the army outside – as if the people trapped with them thought the demon soldiers might go away if they were quiet enough. In the relative silence, Dean could hear the angel’s ragged breathing as he watched the fluttering pulse in Cas’ throat and the rapid movement of his eyes beneath his lids. Cas was dreaming, he realised. He just hoped it was a more pleasant dream than the one he’d been dragged into the previous night.

“He found the pendant,” Sam said at last, having grown impatient waiting for Dean to acknowledge his presence.

Dean slid his gaze to the side to take in his baby brother, who was looking back at him with that ‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to start the Apocalypse’ look he’d developed lately.

“Do you really think it was worth nearly getting him killed for it?” Dean asked bluntly.

“He thought it was worth it,” Sam replied readily.

Dean grunted. It wasn’t the apology he’d been hoping for, but he had to admit Sam had a point. Castiel wouldn’t have risked his life for nothing. Leaning forward in his seat, Dean reached over and fished the pendant out from under Cas’ lumber jacket, gently laying it down again over Castiel’s heart where he could see it. There was nothing different about the pendant – it wasn’t hot to the touch or glowing, or anything – it was the same old necklace Dean had been wearing for years. Dean frowned.

“Why is it that whenever I need answers lately, you’re always unconscious?” Dean asked. He waited a few seconds, as if Cas was going to wake up and answer him, and when he didn’t, Dean looked over at Sam and shrugged. “Worth a shot. You know, last night, all I said was ‘you better not make me come in there after you’, and Cas pulled…”

“…me into… Hey!” Dean blinked a few times, wondering where Sammy had gone, before it occurred to him that he was the one who’d left. Technically he was still in the Red Barn, and he could still hear the pounding and howling of the army outside, but now there was no one else there but him and Cas, who was lying on the bench across from him, watching him serenely.

“No offense, Cas, but you’ve really gotta spice up your dreams a little,” said Dean, offering his hand to help the angel sit up.

“I’ll keep that in mind for next time,” Castiel replied dryly. “Is Sam alright?”

“Yeah, he’s fine,” Dean replied gruffly, giving the angel a stern glare. “What was so damned important about that pendant that you had to go and pull a stunt like that, anyways?”

Castiel looked at Dean – the kind of look that normally delved way past eye contact and deep into soul searching. But after a moment, the angel shook his head and looked away. Whatever he was trying to see, he hadn’t seen it. “I didn’t want to say anything in case I was wrong.”

Dean raised his eyebrows at that, but Castiel didn’t get the hint and remained silent. “Can you tell me now?” Dean prompted.

“If you promise not to ‘freak out’,” Cas answered, his blue eyes peering at him askance.

Dean smirked at Cas’ attempt at using a colloquialism, but quickly schooled his expression to let him know that he was taking him seriously. “Promise.”

“I believe I may have been too literal in my interpretation of the mythology surrounding your pendant,” Castiel said, and for some reason, the angel was reluctant to look him in the eye, now. “Roughly translated, it says that the pendant will ‘shine as the sun in the presence of God’s eternal blessing’. I took that to mean that it would reveal God’s presence if He deemed the seeker worthy.”

“And now you don’t?”

“No.”

“So what, then?” Dean asked, trying to nudge Cas towards revealing his so-called revelation.

Castiel hesitated, shifting awkwardly on the bench. With a soft sigh, he began; “When God created his children he imbued each of us with a unique soul. His first children – the angels – were given souls which were powerful and pure, but were inflexible. Human souls, on the other hand, were capable of free will, but were less…radiant. Many of my brethren believed that was because humans were inherently flawed and weak, but there are those of us who speculated that human souls are only weak in isolation.

“It is rare, but there are what we call bound souls – I think you refer to them as soul mates: two human souls which, when joined, become nearly as strong and as brilliant as those of angels.” Castiel paused there, glancing in Dean’s direction as if waiting for a response.

Dean didn’t know where the angel was going with this, but he swore that if Cas didn’t get to the point pronto, he was going to kick some holy ass. “That’s all very nice and everything, but what has that got to do with my pendant and this demon mud army?”

Castiel rubbed his palms against his denim-clad thighs like he was a nervous teenager on a first date. “The pendant doesn’t reveal the location of God; it is, itself, a vessel containing a fraction of God’s Grace. And if the pendant is present during the ceremonial joining of two souls bound by God’s will, it will release my father’s Grace as a blessing upon them.”

Dean sat there blinking back at him, figuring there was a point in there, but he’d somehow missed it. “Still don’t see how that helps us,” he stated.

Castiel stood and walked a few paces away, keeping his back towards Dean. It was his customary stance for breaking bad news to him, and it made Dean antsy. “God’s Grace – even an infinitesimal fragment of it – would be more than enough to restore me to full strength. At full strength, I would easily be able to dispatch the demon army outside.”

“Yeah, but first we’d have to track down our very own Romeo and Juliet and get them hitched, right?” All Dean got in response from the angel was a quick nod. “What, and you thought we’d be lucky enough to have these love birds holed up with us here in the Red Barn?” Dean scoffed.

Dean’s smile slid from his face when Castiel turned to look at him with such intensity that there could be little doubt what he was thinking.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” Dean rasped, unconsciously shifting as far over on the bench as he could get in an unconscious effort to put a little more distance between them.

Castiel’s eyes fell, and the hurt expression on his face hit Dean like a sucker punch to the gut. “It was only a theory,” Castiel admitted softly.

Dean’s head was whirling with the sudden realisation that Cas thought they might be…he couldn’t even bring himself to think it. “Why, Cas? Why would you think…have I done something…’cause if I did, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to lead you on or anything. Not that I’m not flattered,” he added, still feeling oddly guilty. “It’s just, you know, I usually prefer my eternal soul mates to be a little less…male.” He coughed over the words, feeling the heated blush spreading across his face.

Cas cocked his head at him and gave him a slight frown. “Gender is arbitrary, Dean. I thought you understood that.”

“Maybe for you angels, it is. But from where I’m standing, gender is a pretty damned important.” Dean was up on his feet now, too, although he couldn’t say when, exactly, that had happened.

Castiel’s shoulders slumped even more than they already were. “I apologise. I thought I’d sensed something between us, but I still have difficulty understanding emotions – I fear I may have misjudged our relationship.”

Dean rubbed a hand over his eyes, trying to regroup. This was not a conversation he’d ever imagined he’d be having, and it was turning into a train wreck. He just didn’t want Cas to become a casualty. “Cas...” he started, but when he opened his eyes, he was back in the Red Barn: the real Red Barn, with an unconscious angel in front of him and a mildly panicking brother beside him.

“Damn it!” he muttered and shook off the concerned hand Sammy had lain on his shoulder. Things had just gone from bad to worse, and he had no clue how to fix any of it.

 

 

Chapter 8

 

“Okay. What the hell was that?” asked Sam.

Dean had been laid out on his side on the bench opposite Castiel, and his little brother was pawing at him in an attempt to help him sit up. He batted the helping hands away impatiently. He hadn’t thought he’d been gone long, but he must have been, because the Red Barn Tavern had turned into a full-blown battle zone in the interim. The ceiling had caved in from the weight of the mud on the roof, and every man, woman and child was knee-deep in muck. Water was flying everywhere – from buckets and hoses – and the folks had formed a kind of makeshift assembly line, passing buckets back and forth to be refilled. It reminded Dean of a movie he once saw where a bunch of farmers tried to put out a raging barn fire with tiny buckets filled from a nearby pump. It wasn’t going to be enough to hold the army back, and everybody knew it. But to their credit, not a one of them was giving up.

“How long was I out?” Dean asked, slightly dazed. He was already standing and scanning the room for any glaring holes in their defences.

“Ten minutes,” Sam answered grimly.

It was worse than he’d thought – if this was what it was like after only ten minutes of fighting, they didn’t stand a chance of making it until morning.

“Dean, I think we’re gonna have to make a run for it. There’s no way we can keep this up all night,” said Sam, worry etched deep into the lines of his face.

“We don’t have a choice, Sammy. If we go out there we’re toast, and you know it. Those things will be down our throats before we even get through the parking lot.”

“Then what do you suggest we do?” asked Sam, waving his arms at the chaos surrounding them.

From the darkest corner of the bar a man screamed, but the noise was almost immediately snuffed out. Dean followed the direction the noise had come from and saw that they’d lost the young man who’d helped him rip the table out from their booth. The dirt had encased him, smothered him, and then dragged him down to the floor where it was now slowly devouring him. Dean looked away, feeling more than a little sick. From behind him a woman shrieked and ran from her position on the bucket line to the fallen man. Dean guessed she was his girlfriend. Others shouted at her to leave him, but she was past reasoning, sobbing and wailing as she fell to her hands and knees at his side. For her, the end came quickly, and in the chilled silence that followed her death, Dean made up his mind.

“I need to talk to Cas,” he said, pulling Sam aside.

Sam’s eyes fell on the unconscious angel, but rather than question him, he simply shrugged. “Have at it,” he replied. “Just make it quick – we need all the hands we can get, here.”

That was what Dean loved about his baby bro. No matter how bizarre the situation, he always managed to take it all in stride. Dean clapped him on the back and slid into the booth across from Castiel, taking the angel’s hand in his own. It felt weird, and he knew Sammy was looking at him funny, but it was the only idea that sprang to mind, and Dean was going to go with it.

“Let me back in there, Cas. We’re not done talking.” Dean squeezed his eyes together tightly, but nothing happened. Then he thought it through and added, “Please”.

It must have been the magic word, because he found himself once again in the dim dream tavern with a morose but determined-looking angel squared off against him, like he was expecting a fight.

Dean put his hands out in front of him in a placating gesture. “Hold your fire, Cas. I just came to talk.”

Castiel’s stance relaxed somewhat, but he continued to watch him warily. “There is no need for discussion, Dean. I was clearly wrong in my presumption, and I have already apologised for making you uncomfortable.”

Dean harrumphed and took a few steps closer, proud that Castiel was stoically holding his ground. “There are people dying out there, Cas. And if you’re right, and we… If we do this, and it works? I’m just saying, we owe it to those people out there to give it a go.”

Grief washed over Castiel’s face, leaving his blue eyes empty. “It’s not that simple, Dean. We can’t just go through the motions and repeat the incantation and expect God’s blessing to pour forth from the pendant. This will only work if our souls were created to be joined in this way.”

“But for a while there, you thought they were?” Dean’s eyes trapped the angel’s gaze and refused to let him look away. “Deep down, you thought it would work between us.” Cas moved to turn away, but Dean grabbed him by the shoulders and forced him to remain where he was.

“There were indications,” Castiel muttered, “even before…before I was able to fully comprehend the emotions I’ve been feeling. The fact that of all the people on this planet, you were the one in possession of the pendant should have been a clue. Not to mention the fact that I was the one fated to raise you from damnation. I made you whole again. I marked you. It was because of you that I betrayed Heaven and everything that I knew, and yet despite my blasphemous behaviour, God saw fit to return me to you. But it wasn’t until I lay dying in the hospital and it was your blood that saved me that I began to put the pieces together.”

Dean mulled it over for a moment, nodding his head as the argument began to make a kind of warped sense to him. “Do you still think this might work? I mean, it’s not like we’re your typical couple – hell, we’re not even the same species!”

A sad smile briefly lifted one corner of Castiel’s mouth. “What I think is irrelevant. This isn’t something that can be faked or forced. Either our souls were meant to be joined or they weren’t. No amount of wishful thinking can change the outcome.”

“So you’re just gonna give up, then?” Dean rebuked. “I didn’t immediately jump on board with the flowers and the Hallmark platitudes, so you just hang up your halo and call it quits?”

The look on Castiel’s face was the epitome of puzzlement.

“You can’t tell a guy who’s lived his whole life happily pursuing the opposite sex that his entire way of life has been a sham and just expect him to go with it! It’s not that easy to shift gears, if you get my drift.”

A flicker of hope sparked in Castiel’s eyes as he studied Dean carefully. “Then you do reciprocate my feelings?” he asked bluntly.

Dean felt a moment of rising panic as he prepared to voice something he hadn’t even fully admitted to himself. “I don’t know what I feel,” he replied honestly. “It’s not like I have anything I can compare our relationship with, you know? But I do know that when I got that call from the hospital, and I thought I might lose you...” Dean had to stop and take a breath. “I haven’t felt like that since Sammy died, and I never want to feel anything like that again. It’s just – I never really let myself think about it. I mean, you’re an angel of the Lord; and a guy. In my world, that pretty much takes you out of the running.”

Castiel nodded his head slowly and solemnly, trying to absorb and understand what Dean was telling him. After a moment’s deliberation, he took a couple of steps towards him, breaching the distance between them until they stood less than a foot apart. With a determined gaze, he said, “Kiss me”.

If Dean thought he was close to panic before, then clearly he needed to have his scale readjusted, because this was panic. Castiel was so close he could feel the warm huff of his breath against his throat, and damn if that didn’t stir up something deep down and dirty inside him. What freaked him out most was the way Cas was looking at him – like he was daring him or something. Dean was not the kind of guy who backed down from a dare.

The impulse to bolt was incredibly strong, but it didn’t hold a match to his need to see this through. If he was wrong, if there really wasn’t anything between them and the whole soul mates thing was a bust, then all he’d lost was an ounce of pride and a few minutes of time on the battle field. But if Cas was right…ah, but then, what were the chances of that happening, he wondered?

Steeling himself for what he assumed was going to be a nasty experience, Dean squinched his eyes shut and leaned in, tentatively pressing their lips together. The first thought that sprang to mind was that Cas’ lips were as soft as they looked, and actually, that was the last coherent thought he had, because when Cas’ lips parted against his with a gentle sigh, Dean’s brain melted.

Dean’s hands fisted in Castiel’s jacket, desperately clinging to him as his whole world turned upside-down. The sudden heat – the toe-curling lightning jolts that arced over his entire body – was unlike anything he’d experienced before, and there wasn’t a whole lot that he hadn’t already experienced in his life. And when their tongues touched for the first time, the sensory overload was almost too much to bear.

Dean forced himself to pull away, his mind reeling in the aftermath of what he could only describe as a life-altering experience. Cas was breathing hard, his pupils blown and his lips parted and just a little swollen from their kiss. It was the single hottest thing Dean had ever seen, and if it hadn’t been for the war raging in the bar outside their secret haven, he would have indulged his urge to sink back into those lips again and stay there.

“Okay, I’m convinced,” Dean rasped, nudging Castiel’s nose with his own. “Now what do we do?”

The smile that spread across the angel’s face was so genuinely sweet that it made Dean’s chest ache to see it. “First, you’ll have to find a way to wake me up,” said Cas, trying and failing to douse his smile and look serious.

“How about a bucket of ice water over your head? That usually does the trick,” Dean suggested.

“Dean,” Castiel said in reproach.

“Okay, we’ll find another way. Next?”

“We’ll need witnesses, and someone to read the incantation out loud.”

“That shouldn’t be a problem,” Dean replied. “And…?”

“And we will need to seal the deal with a kiss. If we are meant to be bonded, the pendant will release God’s Grace upon us,” Castiel answered.

Dean beamed at him, “Great – let’s do this thing!”

Suddenly, Castiel became sombre, and he shifted his eyes away from Dean’s. “You must understand that this is not a step to be taken lightly. Even if our souls are incompatible, we will still be married in the eyes of God.”

“You mean the whole ‘love, honour and obey, ‘til death do us part’ thing?” Dean asked, to which Castiel nodded gravely. Dean swallowed hard. That wasn’t something he’d considered. But hell, it wasn’t like he was likely to live all that long in any case, right, he thought? And anyways, if it did work, then they were going to be tied to each other for all eternity, so what was the big deal? Dean nodded firmly. “I’m in,” he said, giving Cas his most winning smile.

Castiel tilted his head at him and pursed his lips, which now only made Dean want to kiss him. “This is serious, Dean. It’s not something you can back out of afterwards.”

“I get it, Cas,” Dean assured him and gave him a pat on the shoulder. “Now let’s go ride off into the sunset together.”

The angel frowned at him, but it never reached his eyes, which were still smiling. Castiel reached out to Dean’s forehead with two fingers and poked him back into the land of the living.

“Dude! What took you so long?” Sam barked at him over his shoulder. He was busy hosing away three mud soldiers that were intent on getting into Dean’s booth.

Dean sat up on his bench, feeling disoriented. On one hand, his life was in serious jeopardy, but on the other hand, he’d never felt happier in his life. Sam was staring at him like he’d gone soft in the head, and Dean didn’t get it until he realised he was smiling like a loon.

“Sammy, how would you like to be my best man?” he asked, his grin widening at the befuddled look on his brother’s face.

 

 

Chapter 9

 

Sam gawped at his brother, thinking that he must have shorted out a few vital synapses when he’d gone all Dead Zone with Castiel. “Excuse me?” he said, squinting at Dean like that might help clear things up.

“Don’t really have time to explain; you’ll just have to go with me on this, alright, Sammy?” Dean had on his dead-serious expression, but there was something buzzing just below the surface – a kind of crazed excitement that he’d never seen in his brother’s eyes before. It had Sam majorly concerned.

“You’re getting married? When? To who?”

Dean snatched the hose from his hands and took over spraying away the mud that continued to creep up on them. Sam hadn’t even realised he’d dropped the ball, he was so blown away.

“We need to get Cas awake, and we need someone who can perform the ceremony,” Dean replied, neatly avoiding Sam’s questions.

“What, now?” asked Sam in disbelief.

“Yes, now,” Dean ordered. “See if anyone’s got smelling salts – maybe in a first aid kit or something.”

“You could always try dumping a bucket of cold water on him,” Sam suggested, still struggling to understand what the hell was going on.

“That’s what I said!” Dean vehemently agreed. “But Cas didn’t like that idea.”

Sam gave Dean one last inquisitive frown before heading off to do as he’d been told. He was running on auto-pilot, following Dean’s orders on blind faith, because he was too afraid to ask questions. He already had an inkling of what the answers might be, and right now denial was working well for him.

 

***

 

In between hosing off the dirt demons, Dean tried to wake Castiel up. The shoulder shake failed miserably, as did the arm pinch and the cheek slap. It’s true, he was reluctant to use any real force, because the poor guy had already taken more abuse than he could handle, but Dean was running out of ideas. And meanwhile, more of the muddy bastards were dropping from the hole in the roof, rapidly beginning to outnumber them.

Sam trotted back up to him a few minutes later but he came empty-handed. “Sorry; no luck with the smelling salts,” he said. “But it turns out the mayor can perform marriages.”

“You mean that rickety old guy who was on stage last night?” Dean asked.

“Yeah, the old guy. What were you expecting, a priest? Even if there was one here, I doubt they’d agree to do it,” Sam retorted with a smirk, making it clear that he’d figured out who Dean was planning to marry.

“Fine, he’ll have to do,” Dean replied, ignoring the teasing twinkle in his brother’s eyes.

A chorus of shouts broke out from a spot near the front door, drawing their attention. The wall there was bowing and cracking from the pressure of the mud trying to get inside. Sam turned back to him, all mirth forgotten. “Seriously, Dean…do you really think this is a good time for this? If you haven’t noticed, we’re kind of in the middle of something here.”

Dean held his brother’s gaze steadily, letting him know just how serious he was. “I know it sounds crazy, but this could be our only shot at getting out of here alive.”

If Sam had any more doubts, he hid them well. Without a word, he took off again, but he returned moments later carrying a bucket full of water. Dean didn’t have time to protest before his brother had unceremoniously dumped the contents on top of the unconscious angel’s head.

The effect was immediate: Castiel jerked awake, his eyes springing wide open as he spluttered and coughed out the water that had gone down his windpipe. The murderous glare he fixed on Sam would have been far scarier if he didn’t look so much like a drowned kitten.

Sam smiled down at him apologetically. “Sorry – we were out of options.”

The angry glare continued for a solid forty seconds during which time Dean stood transfixed by the glistening droplets of water dripping off Castiel’s hair and eyelashes. Now that he’d allowed himself to admit his heretofore latent attraction to the angel, it was pretty much impossible to ignore.

“Were you able to find someone to recite the incantation?” Castiel asked at last, tearing his eyes away their task of boring holes into Sam’s head to address Dean.

“Incantation?” asked Sam, earning him a fresh glare from the angel. “I thought this was a wedding.”

Castiel grunted as he attempted to sit up. Dean was there in a heartbeat, helping him. “The incantation predates modern marriage rites, but the result will be much the same.”

“We got a mayor here who’ll do the honours,” Dean said. “Think you’ll be able to stand up, or should we bring the old fart over here?”

“I will stand,” Castiel replied, and stubbornly tried to do just that, even though he was barely able to rise more than an inch from the bench.

“Give me a hand here, Sammy,” Dean requested, and Sam bent down on the other side of Castiel to help lift him to his feet. All colour drained from the angel’s face, and it was immediately evident that they needed to make it quick or they’d lose him again.

“Where to?” asked Dean.

“The stage,” Sam replied as he slung his arm around Castiel’s back to provide added support. The two of them book-ended the angel and half dragged him over to the stage, slogging through mud, puddles, and the wreckage of the ceiling as they went.

The Mayor of Red River was standing at the podium looking lost and confused. Somehow, through everything, the man had managed to hold onto his hat, and he had it tightly crammed down past his ears despite the fact that it was sopping wet and starting to wilt. The blonde waitress who’d guided him on stage the previous night was there for a repeat performance, standing next to the old man with her arm looped through his to keep him upright.

Dean was starting to think this was the most pathetic wedding ceremony in the history of wedding ceremonies, what with half the people present, including one of the grooms, barely capable of standing on their own two feet. A reluctant clutch of the surviving barflies had apparently agreed to stand guard and ward off the enemy during the nuptials, but it was clear that they thought the whole thing was absurd.

When Dean, Castiel and Sam lugged their sorry carcasses up onto the bar’s stage, the tottery old mayor blinked at them with watery-eyed bafflement. “Where’s the bride?” he asked, his voice whistling like a reed in the wind.

“Got him right here,” Dean answered, patting Cas on the stomach, and then wiping his hand dry on his own jeans.

Castiel gave him a dirty look, but didn’t say anything; probably because he didn’t have the energy for it.

“You can’t marry him,” the old guy said to Dean in a loud stage whisper. “He’s a man.”

“No, really? I hadn’t noticed,” Dean snarked back at him. “We’re getting married. End of discussion.”

“But-but-but…you can’t,” the mayor insisted. “It wouldn’t be legal.”

“The laws of man are inconsequential,” Castiel spoke up.

Dean quickly added, “What he means is, we’re not worried about making this legal. It’s what’s in our hearts that counts.” Dean didn’t have to look over at Sam to know the guy was making a face at him. As it was, Dean was finding it hard not to gag on the sugary sentiment himself.

The mayor shook his head and mumbled something along the lines of ‘well, I guess now I’ve seen everything’. As if being confronted with an army of animated mud wasn’t enough of a kicker for one day! “Well, get on over here, then,” he voiced more loudly.

Dean nodded at Sam to let go of Cas, and the two of them approached the mayor alone. It turned out Castiel was far heavier than he looked, but Dean refused to show how much effort it was costing him to keep the angel vertical.

“Dearly beloved, we are gathered…”

“Let’s skip to the good part, okay Pops?” Dean interjected, shifting Cas against his side to get a better grip on him.  
That seemed to shake Castiel out of the stupor he’d fallen into, and he began digging around in the front pocket of Dean’s pants. That nearly made Dean lose it, and as it was, his face had probably just turned every shade of red imaginable, if the heat in his cheeks was anything to go by.

“Cas…what the hell?” Dean choked, squirming as the angel’s fingers came dangerously close to skipping the wedding and going straight for the honeymoon.

With a satisfied smile, Castiel dug a piece of paper from some hidden crevice in Dean’s pocket. Dean’s eyebrows shot up at that, because he’d be damned if he knew how it had got there.

Handing the folded sheet of paper over to the mayor, Castiel said, “If you would be so kind as to read this out loud?”

The mayor blinked and squinted at the writing on the paper until he finally gave up. “Son,” he said, “either I’m in need of a pair of heavy-duty reading glasses, or this thing ain’t in English.”

“It’s Enochian,” Castiel replied, like that was any help. “It’s written phonetically. All you need to do is sound it out.”

The old man tutted and sighed and studied the paper some more, and as Dean shifted from foot to foot impatiently, there was a deafening crack from the front of the building. The wooden slats by the door had finally snapped under the duress of holding back the rest of the mud army.

“Sooner would be better,” Dean prompted urgently.

As the rest of their audience ran off to join the main battle, the mayor nodded his head and started hesitantly reading the strange language written out for him on the rumpled piece of paper. Enochian made as much sense to Dean as it did to the old man, so he had to watch Cas’ face to tell if it was working or not – not that Castiel’s expression gave much away.

With all the shouting and screaming, Dean didn’t even notice the mayor had finished reading the incantation until Castiel subtly nudged him with his elbow. Dean’s eyes went wide. This was it. Now or never. And the look in the angel’s eyes made it clear that the final decision was up to him.

Heart pounding in his ears, Dean gave him a quick, decisive nod. They jostled with each other until they were face to face and plastered against each other in a tight hug. Dean was just leaning in to seal the deal when Cas shied away.

“Wait,” the angel said and began fishing around beneath the collar of his borrowed and soaking wet lumber jacket until he dredged up the pendant that had been trapped within its folds. Then his impossibly blue eyes peered up at Dean and he tilted his head back, lips parted, just waiting to be kissed.

A flood of hot desire engulfed Dean, and he honestly couldn’t care if the Pope himself was watching, because he loved Cas – felt it bone deep, like the best kind of ache. This time, their kiss was anything but timid. Dean brought their mouths together with nothing held back, teeth clashing, tongues battling for dominance, and dear God it was perfect. Castiel rumbled out a broken moan that coursed through Dean like a raging brush fire, and for a second, he thought he might literally be burning. The sensation was so convincing that Dean was forced to break off the kiss and open his eyes to make sure he was still in one piece.

An eruption of pure white light – brighter than the sun itself – suddenly plumed out all around them. It was like a star had gone supernova on them right there in the little tavern. And the accompanying boom was what Dean imagined it would be like to be at ground zero during a nuclear explosion. The floor shook and buckled underfoot, and dust rained down from what remained of the ceiling. Every bottle and glass behind the bar shattered in an instant, and then, as quickly as it started, it was over.

In the residual light of the blast, Dean caught a fleeting glimpse of the shadows cast by Castiel’s wings, spread wide and massive, and somehow proud. Yes, Dean would later have to admit his jaw was hanging open in a wholly undignified manner at the sight, but c’mon! How could a guy not be impressed?

Dean was vaguely aware that stuff was happening in his periphery, but at the moment, he couldn’t take his eyes off of Castiel. There was a distinct glow about him – a raw energy that crackled in the air between them like electricity. He was no longer the drenched, barefoot, banged-up hobo that Dean had dragged into the bar. Now he was resplendent; pristine and unblemished, and…and the trench coat was back. Dammit, Dean thought, that thing made more comebacks than the Rolling Stones.

A not-so-subtle cough finally managed to get Dean’s attention. Sam was standing a couple of feet away, desperately pretending he hadn’t just watched them kiss. “Uh, Dean…please tell me you didn’t just sell your soul or something stupid like that.”

Dean scowled at him, but then he thought about it and the scowl turned into a warped grin, because really? He kind of had sold his soul; or given it away, as the case may be. And he was perfectly fine with it. Just for kicks, he thought he’d let Sam sweat it for a while, so instead of answering him, Dean took Cas by the hand and led the angel off the stage without a word.

“Uh…Dean?” Sam called out after him, making Dean’s grin broaden.

Castiel looked at him in confusion, and he gave the angel’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “Explanations can wait until tomorrow,” he explained, getting a knowing nod in response.

They carefully picked their way through the muddy wreckage of the Red Barn Tavern, not in the least bit surprised to find that the mud army had been well and truly nuked and that their victims were alive and kicking again. After all, if God’s Grace wasn’t enough to swing a few well-deserved miracles, then nothing was.

Outside, the crisp night air was alive with the sound of crickets and the sky was bejewelled with a blanket of stars. Dean stood in the empty parking lot, holding the hand of the angel with whom he was now eternally joined, and took a deep, satisfying breath.

“Where do we go from here?” asked Dean, sliding his gaze over to Castiel who was watching him intently.

“Anywhere we want,” Castiel answered, his bright eyes managing to express both shyness and exhilaration all at once. One thing Dean knew for sure, wherever they ended up, it was going to be one helluva ride.

 

 

Epilogue

 

After leaving a note for Sammy on the windshield of the mud-encrusted Impala saying they were taking the rest of the weekend off (and demanding that the Impala be all nice and shiny when they returned), Dean told Cas that he’d always wanted to go to Hawaii. The next thing he knew, they were standing outside the Lucky Lei Oceanside Resort and Casino, where the sun had yet to set and the breeze ruffled warmly through their hair.

“You’re kidding me! We’re seriously in Hawaii?” Dean sputtered, his eyes roaming everywhere, trying to take in everything at once.

“I said we could go anywhere,” Castiel replied, sounding unsure. “Was there someplace else you’d rather go?”

“No!” Dean assured him fervently. He felt like a little kid in Disneyland. The winding path leading to the front door of the hotel was lit with tiki torches, and as they stood there, a smiling, exotic-looking girl wearing next to nothing approached them and draped leis around their necks. “This is Hawaii !”

Next to him, Castiel chuckled, and it sounded amazing. Dean was going to make him do that more often, even if they were facing the Apocalypse.

“I assume you want to do some exploring?” Castiel asked, nodding his head towards the beach where there was a bar set up and people were dancing in the sand under colourful lanterns.

“Damn right, I do,” Dean replied with a sly smile and began dragging Castiel towards the hotel. “And you’re the first thing on my list of things to explore.”

Then out of nowhere, Dean’s arm was nearly jerked out of its socket, forcing him to stop. Looking back, he saw that Cas had planted his feet and was staring at him with wide and slightly terrified eyes. “Cas? What’s wrong?”

“It’s just that…after what you’d said earlier, I didn’t think you’d want to, you know, copulate with me.”

“Geez, Cas! You gotta cut it out with the dirty talk when we’re in public, okay?” said Dean, starting to feel like the blush creeping up onto his face was going to become a permanent fixture from now on. “And if you hadn’t noticed,” he added in a harsh whisper, “I was completely on board with the kissing, and it can only get better from there.”

The stark fear still rounded out the angel’s eyes, and it was then that Dean flashed back to a night that seemed like a lifetime ago – a night when Cas was faced with the prospect of losing his cherry in the brothel he’d been dragged into. It was the same look of doom that was on his face now.

“Wait a minute,” Dean said, “you’re not freaking out over the whole losing your virginity thing, are you?” Sure enough, Castiel shifted his gaze down and away, and…yep, there it was – the nervous rubbing of the back of his neck. “Tell me one thing, Cas. Do you trust me?”

Large blue eyes locked onto his, and Dean could actually feel Castiel searching his mind, reading his thoughts and his feelings. And to his great surprise, Dean found that he could likewise read Castiel. He felt the intense vulnerability that came from being thousands of years old and yet being so new to the minefield that was human emotions. He knew that this was an act that Cas had always held as sacred, and had never once believed he would experience. Dean also felt the moment when the angel let go of it all and unequivocally relinquished his heart into his care. To be shown that much trust was humbling in the extreme, and Dean made a promise right then and there that he would safeguard it with his life, and then some, if need be.

No more needed to be said, as Castiel willingly followed him into the lobby of the swanky tourist resort. At the front desk, Dean slapped down a newly minted Visa onto the counter and asked the unshakable, seen-it-all-before hotel manager for the honeymoon suite. The slick-haired man looked down his nose at them, and Dean could tell he was about to tell them that suite was already booked, when something flashed on his computer monitor that clearly took him by surprise.

“Yes Sir,” he said, suddenly all solicitous. “Of course, Sir; please, if you’ll follow me.”

As the now-grovelling hotel manager led them to the elevators, yammering on about the hotel’s unending list of amenities, Dean cast a questioning glance at Castiel. The angel, however, seemed to be as nonplussed as he was.

The honeymoon suite, it turned out, was also a penthouse suite, and when the manager opened the door for them and stepped aside, Dean’s eyes nearly bulged out of his head. To say it was vast would be an understatement. It was downright decadent. One whole wall was solid glass and sliding doors, with a balcony that stretched the entire length and a view that was simply breathtaking. And the bed…

There was no way the Visa Dean had forged would cover even an hour in this room, let alone a weekend, and Dean was about to tell the hotel manager there’d been a mistake, when the man in question drew his attention to the enormous gift basket that adorned the round breakfast table near the window.

“Compliments of your benefactor,” the manager said with a polite bow and then made a bee-line for the door, leaving them to their own devices.

Castiel raised an eyebrow at him and Dean nodded, giving him the go-ahead to check out the basket. It was a decadent arrangement filled with bath and massage oils, fluffy white bath robes and more chocolate and sweets than they could consume in a year. Castiel plucked out the note that was wedged between a pair of slippers and a coffee mug filled with gourmet coffee beans. He read it quickly and handed it over to Dean.

“Congrats on the holy vows, bro. Wish I could have been there. Not. Thanks for royally pissing off Mike, Lucy and the entire brat pack. Watching the fall-out has been a real thrill. Enjoy your honeymoon. My treat. And don’t say I never did anything for you.

“Yours sincerely, Gabriel.”

Dean frowned and turned over the note, hoping there was more to it. “What was that all about?” he asked Cas.

Castiel shrugged back at him and deftly snuck a mini Toblerone out of the basket and cracked it open. Two of the chocolaty peaks disappeared into the angel’s mouth, but before Dean could demand his fair share, there was a knock at their door.

Warily, Dean approached the door, peering out through the peep hole to see who it was. On the other side of the fish-eyed lens a pubescent bell hop stared back at him, holding up a bottle of champagne nested in a bucket of ice. Dean cautiously opened the door, figuring that if Gabriel knew how to find them, then anybody could, and the kid could be some kind of decoy.

“Can you sign for this, Sir,” the young man squeaked out, trembling a little under Dean’s piercing glare.

Dean narrowed his eyes suspiciously at him, but he took the receipt and the pen that were held out for him and signed ‘John Bonham’ on the bottom line. The kid snatched back the paper and pen and handed over the champagne with visible relief.

“Huh, would ya look at this,” Dean said, shutting the door behind him. “We’re here five minutes and already we’re being showered with presents.”

“Who’s it from?” Castiel asked, sauntering over to join him and licking the remains of the chocolate bar from his fingers. Dean stifled a groan at the sight and reluctantly refocused on the champagne he was holding.

There was a note tied to the ribbon around the neck of the bottle, and Dean read it aloud. “Hi guys. Congratulations on tying the knot. I saw the whole thing in brain-splitting Technicolor, so thanks for that. Talk about an ingenious way to take Dean off the vessel market! Kudos! I’d just like to ask, as a personal favour, if you would mind keeping the lights off tonight. There are some things even a prophet doesn’t need to know. Oh, and FYI, Gabriel was here when I got the message, so don’t be surprised if you get a call from him. Yours truly, Chuck.”

“Okay,” Dean growled in frustration, “am I missing something here?” A light went off behind Cas’ eyes, quickly followed by a sneaky-assed smile. “What? Let me in on the joke, already.”

“This is the first time since the dawn of creation that an angel and a human have become bonded souls,” Castiel said, as if he’d been stupid not to see it before. “We’re inseparable, Dean,” he explained.

“Yeah, I got that. So?” asked Dean with some annoyance.

“So, nothing on Earth or in Heaven can come between us. Not even Michael.”

And there it was – the light bulb going off over Dean’s head as he finally got it. “I can’t be his vessel anymore.”

“And I can no longer be denied access to Heaven, which is where our souls will ultimately reside,” Castiel added with a hint of smugness.

“Well, I for one think that calls for a celebration,” Dean declared. “Where, oh where should we start? Champagne? Chocolates? Bubble ba…” Dean’s stream of babble was abruptly cut off by Castiel’s lips smashing into his in a bruising kiss.

“To hell with the champagne,” Castiel grumbled out between hungry kisses.

“Couldn’t agree more,” Dean gasped back, attacking Castiel’s trench coat and suit with single-minded glee. “And tomorrow I’m taking you shopping for a new outfit. Preferably something with fewer buttons,” he groused, fumbling with the angel’s stubborn clothing.

Without batting an eye, Castiel ripped his shirt open, buttons flying every which direction. “Whatever you say,” the angel agreed with an evil grin before eagerly resuming their kiss.

 

***

 

In the hallway outside, a bell hop who looked suspiciously like the Trickster hung a ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign on their doorknob. “Best of luck, baby bro,” he said with a smirk and then vanished into thin air.


End file.
